Fig. 5. Registry additionality criteria for renewable energy projects.

The share of renewable energy (RE) offset credits retired by all twenty companies in 2020–2023 by country of origin and the share that meets additionality criteria set by registries. Test 1 (based on rules from GS and VCS) checks if a renewable energy project is located in a LDC. Test 2 (based on rules by GS) checks if the project is located in a LIC or LMIC where the penetration level of the proposed energy technology is below 5% of all grid-installed electricity capacity. The share of renewable energy offsets passing either additionality test is marked in blue. An offset credit only needs to pass one of the two tests to demonstrate a minimum degree of additionality. The period 2005–2021 for LIC/LMIC classifications covers all project start years in the dataset. Data for country classifications and renewables shares are sourced from the United Nations⁸⁰, World Bank⁷⁹ and IRENA⁵⁷. For test 2, full results by country and renewable energy technology appear in Fig. S7. Bundled energy offsets (limited to 213,465 tCO2e from India) are excluded when conducting test 2 since these projects mix renewables technologies.