Volumetric Water Benefit Accounting
The de-facto methodology standard for replenishment and volumetric water claims, with a companion Water Quality Benefit Accounting framework.
- Registry
- WRI
- Sector
- Water replenishment
- Credit
- VWB · m³
- Issued as
- org.hypercerts.claim.activity
The issued hypercert is a batch of VWB credits recorded at once, comparable to a registry issuance batch. It carries weighted contributors, a work scope and a rights record, so any app in the ATProto Collective Funding Ecosystem can read it natively.
Overview
Volumetric Water Benefit Accounting 2.0 is a guidance document from the World Resources Institute and partners for quantifying the volumetric water benefits of water stewardship activities. It provides a six step, principle based approach for identifying activities such as watershed restoration, improved irrigation, and supply protection, and for quantifying, tracking, and communicating the resulting benefits. A water benefit is expressed as a volume of water, for example cubic metres or gallons, provided to or protected within a catchment over a defined period. The guidance is voluntary and covers both direct and enabled volumetric water benefits.
Sources: methodology document · World Resources Institute
01 · Roles
Standard Registry
role · registry
Owns the policy, approves participants, anchors each issuance to its evidence.
Project Proponent
role · proponent
Registers the project and submits monitoring reports.
Validation & Verification Body
role · vvb
Independently validates the design and verifies monitored data.
02 · Policy graph
10 nodesThe 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. Hover to trace, click to inspect; revise edges (dashed) send work back.
Hover to trace · click to inspect
Issue water credits
Standard RegistryA hypercert batching the water credits issued for the period, anchored to the bundle.
- Lexicon
- org.broadlistening.policy.block.issue
- Input
- org.hypercerts.collection + the computed total
- Output
- org.hypercerts.claim.activity
Node kinds in this graph
- Role selectorg.broadlistening.policy.block.roleSelect
- Request documentorg.broadlistening.policy.block.requestDocument
- Revieworg.broadlistening.policy.block.review
- Persistorg.broadlistening.policy.block.persist
- Computeorg.broadlistening.policy.block.compute
- Aggregateorg.broadlistening.policy.block.aggregate
- Issue hypercertorg.broadlistening.policy.block.issue
- Provenanceorg.broadlistening.policy.block.provenance
control-flow event
revise (sends 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.
org.broadlistening.policy.methodology/wri-vwba
{
"$type": "org.broadlistening.policy.methodology",
"code": "VWBA 2.0",
"name": "Volumetric Water Benefit Accounting",
"registry": "World Resources Institute (WRI)",
"sector": "Water replenishment",
"creditType": "water",
"status": "active",
"version": "2.0",
"scopes": [
"Water",
"Volumetric",
"Replenishment"
],
"aligns": [
"AWS Standard"
],
"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/wri-vwba-water-intervention",
"at://did:plc:bl0adl1sten1ngp0l1cyreg/org.broadlistening.policy.schema/wri-vwba-water-monitoring"
],
"graph": "at://did:plc:bl0adl1sten1ngp0l1cyreg/org.broadlistening.policy.graph/wri-vwba",
"issuesAs": "org.hypercerts.claim.activity",
"workScope": "at://did:plc:bl0adl1sten1ngp0l1cyreg/org.hypercerts.workscope.cel/wri-vwba-scope",
"rights": "at://did:plc:bl0adl1sten1ngp0l1cyreg/org.hypercerts.claim.rights/wri-vwba-rights",
"createdAt": "2025-01-01T00:00:00.000Z"
}04 · Schemas
Water Intervention
schema · water-interventionThe catchment, activity and baseline for a water benefit.
| Field | Type | Req | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| catchment | string | ✓ | Catchment / watershed identifier. |
| activity | string | ✓ | Replenishment, efficiency or quality activity. |
| method | string | ✓ | Accounting method, e.g. WRI VWBA 2.0. |
| baselineM3 | number | ✓ | Baseline annual water balance (m³). |
Water Benefit Measurement
schema · water-monitoringMeasured volumetric (or quality) water benefit for a period.
| Field | Type | Req | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| project | ref | ✓ | strongRef to the registered intervention. |
| period | string | ✓ | Measurement period (ISO-8601 interval). |
| benefitM3 | number | ✓ | Net volumetric water benefit (m³). |
| qualityParam | string | · | Optional quality parameter (e.g. kg N, kg P) for quality benefits. |
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