Nature Framework (Nature Credits)

Overview

The Nature Framework is an asset methodology under Verra's Sustainable Development Verified Impact Standard (SD VISta), active since October 29, 2024. It provides core principles and methodological steps for quantifying biodiversity outcomes from conservation and restoration activities across terrestrial, freshwater, and marine ecosystems, and lets projects issue tradable Nature Credits as standalone assets. A Nature Credit represents a measured positive biodiversity outcome and is intended as an investment in nature, and it may not be used for offsetting.

Sources: methodology document · Verra Verified Carbon Standard

01 · Roles

The workflow as an explicit directed graph. In Graph each column is one role, so you can see who acts at each step; every node names the org.broadlistening.policy.block.* def it resolves to plus its input and output record. Data flow switches to a lineage view that makes explicit what data each node needs and makes, with dependency arcs tracing every record back to the node that produced it, including where the Darwin Core occurrence + measurement records feed in. Hover to trace, click to inspect; revise edges (dashed) send work back.

03 · Generated lexicon records

The records this methodology compiles to, ready to write to a PDS. The first tabs are the new policy engine records; the ★ claim.activity tab and those after it are reused ATProto Collective Funding Ecosystem records (org.hypercerts.*): the issued hypercert batch, its rights, an example verification attachment and a retirement receipt. The ◈ dwc.occurrence and ◈ dwc.measurement tabs are the Darwin Core field evidence the monitoring node writes; see the section below.

{
  "$type": "org.broadlistening.policy.methodology",
  "code": "SD VISta NF",
  "name": "Nature Framework (Nature Credits)",
  "registry": "Verra Verified Carbon Standard (VCS)",
  "sector": "Biodiversity",
  "creditType": "biodiversity",
  "status": "testing",
  "version": "1.0",
  "scopes": [
    "Biodiversity",
    "Nature-positive",
    "AFOLU"
  ],
  "roles": [
    {
      "id": "registry",
      "name": "Standard Registry",
      "permission": "Owns the policy, approves participants, anchors each issuance to its evidence."
    },
    {
      "id": "proponent",
      "name": "Project Proponent",
      "permission": "Registers the project and submits monitoring reports."
    },
    {
      "id": "vvb",
      "name": "Validation & Verification Body",
      "permission": "Independently validates the design and verifies monitored data."
    }
  ],
  "schemas": [
    "at://did:plc:bl0adl1sten1ngp0l1cyreg/org.broadlistening.policy.schema/verra-nature-framework-bio-baseline",
    "at://did:plc:bl0adl1sten1ngp0l1cyreg/org.broadlistening.policy.schema/verra-nature-framework-bio-monitoring"
  ],
  "graph": "at://did:plc:bl0adl1sten1ngp0l1cyreg/org.broadlistening.policy.graph/verra-nature-framework",
  "issuesAs": "org.hypercerts.claim.activity",
  "workScope": "at://did:plc:bl0adl1sten1ngp0l1cyreg/org.hypercerts.workscope.cel/verra-nature-framework-scope",
  "rights": "at://did:plc:bl0adl1sten1ngp0l1cyreg/org.hypercerts.claim.rights/verra-nature-framework-rights",
  "createdAt": "2025-01-01T00:00:00.000Z"
}

04 · Schemas

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