The Voluntary Carbon Standard (VCS) was released on 19 November 2007. Work to develop the Voluntary Carbon Standard was initiated by The Climate Group, the International Emissions Trading Association and the World Economic Forum in late 2005. The World Business Council for Sustainable Development joined the initiative as a founding partner in 2007.

Under the VCS, offsets must be real (have happened), additional (beyond business-as-usual activities), measurable, permanent (not temporarily displace emissions), independently verified and unique (not used more than once to offset emissions).

The objectives of the VCS program are to:

• Standardize and provide transparency and credibility to the voluntary offset market.
• Enhance business, consumer and government confidence in voluntary offsets.
  Create a trusted and tradable voluntary offset credit; the Voluntary Carbon Unit. (VCU).
• Stimulate additional investments in emissions reductions and low carbon solutions.
• Experiment and stimulate innovation in emission reduction technologies and offer lessons that can be build into future regulation.
• Provide a clear chain of ownership over voluntary offsets that prevents them being used twice. This is achieved through multiple VCS registries and a central project database that is open to the public.

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