Cooking with Less: The Impact of the Latest Article 6.4 Decisions

In our pursuit of perfection, have we lost sight of the Paris Agreement’s goal: addressing the urgent threat of climate change while recognizing the needs of developing country Parties, who are particularly vulnerable to its adverse impacts?

By Hilda Galt, Partner at Climate Focus

Between 5 – 9 October 2026, the Article 6.4 Supervisory Body (SBM) met to discuss three items key to the future of carbon finance for the clean cooking sector: two methodologies and whether this project category should be required to make deductions to account for reversal risk. The outcomes will significantly impact the carbon financing landscape for clean cooking.

First, the two methodologies include several elements that underestimate emissions impact and therefore reduce carbon credit supply per project, pushing up the carbon prices project developers need to make their projects viable. Unable to bear the certification costs and risks, this will sadly prohibit many project developers – and most importantly the households they target – from accessing carbon finance through Article 6.4. Second, project developers will likely seek certification under other carbon standards, as long as the Integrity Council for Voluntary Carbon Markets approves their methodologies. And finally, institutional stoves, such as those used in schools and hospitals, are likely to prove more economically attractive in carbon markets. Institutional stoves can earn more carbon credits per device, making such a project easier to manage. Tracking and tracing every stove’s use in real-time via Stove Use Monitors is also going to be expected, rather than the best-in-class exception to the norm that it now is.

What happened?

It was an intense week of SBM discussions, during which it became clear that stakeholders had differing priorities: those seeking to ensure environmental integrity at all costs, and those considering the impact of rule-making on climate action and associated project viability. Half of all low- and middle-income countries have one or more explicit clean cooking measures in their Nationally Determined Contributions, most of which are conditional on international financing.[1] Of course, carbon markets are not the only source of this financing, but they are a key enabler in bringing down investment risk. As much as 95% of investment tracked by the Clean Cooking Alliance in 2024 went to companies operating or establishing carbon programmes.[2]

In the end, safeguarding environmental integrity won out.

Three items dominated the discussions:

Permanence and durability.

In simple terms, non-permanence refers to the risk that any carbon saved and stored in biomass (e.g. trees) could later be lost through natural or human-induced causes, such as logging. The SBM spent most time discussing whether reversal risk deductions should be made for cookstoves, how these deductions should be calculated, whether they should apply immediately or be phased in, and whether exemptions should be allowed for certain projects due to size or location (such as being in a Least Developed Country).

Ultimately, the SBM decided that clean cooking projects must make deductions to account for reversal risks. These credits must be immediately cancelled, rather than added to a buffer pool, although projects are exempt from monitoring greenhouse gas reservoirs. This recognizes that project developers do not have ownership or control over the areas from which biomass fuel is harvested for cooking. There will be no phase-in of the requirements, and no exemptions due to project size or location.

This is a significant departure from prior carbon market practice, and will result in cookstoves losing anywhere between 6 – 60% of issued carbon credits.[3] This is largely due to the Article 6.4 Baseline Standard requiring that emission reductions “are very unlikely to be overestimated”, as opposed to being unlikely to be overestimated.[4] What appears as a simple word in fact had significant ramifications on how reversals are accounted for.[5]

The Methodologies Expert Panel (MEP) acknowledges that this change means that “the clean cooking activities may not go ahead, and both project developers and buyers may move to relatively cheaper activities instead… Therefore, respectively higher prices would need to be paid for A6.4ERs to ensure the feasibility of clean cooking activities addressing reversal risks.”[6] The MEP estimates that the buffer pool deductions alone will require carbon prices to be raised from 5 – 74%, with fuelwood efficiency projects (which typically target bottom-of-the-pyramid households) being particularly affected. In addition, permanence deductions come on top of other Article 6.4 deductions, including share of proceeds (5% of credits) and contributions to Overall Mitigation in Global Emissions (2% of credits). Whether buyers will be willing to pay higher prices remains to be seen, but early indications are not positive.

A6.4-AMM-004: Cooking energy transitions methodology (version 01.0)

This methodology was originally developed by the Clean Cooking and Climate Consortium (4C), led by the Clean Cooking Alliance. It aims to cover the most common household cooking transition scenarios. It was adopted by the SBM with a request to expand its application to institutional stoves (e.g. those used in schools and hospitals).

The approved methodology includes several approaches that underestimate emission reductions achieved. Most relevant is the calculation approach for making deductions to account for reversal risk (as outlined above), and requirements for baseline downward adjustment (which reduces emission reductions incrementally each year). A proposal was put forward to exempt a subset of technologies from baseline downward adjustment where this could impact project viability. The Baseline Standard allows exemptions in such cases, but the SBM considered that the methodology’s use of historic or business-as-usual emissions as a baseline should take precedence.

Other safeguards include, for example, caps on baseline energy consumption and limits on the portion of devices a project can claim are operational without additional customer support actions or Stove Use Monitors (SUMs). SUMs are mandatory on all devices from 01 January 2029, ensuring that stove use is accurately captured rather than estimated based on sampling.

The SBM agreed to raise the additionality performance standard threshold, which essentially looks at how prevalent a technology is before it can be considered additional. The methodology now allows up to 7.5% (up from 4.5%) of households in the target population to have a technology with the same or higher efficiency as the project stove. In addition,  projects can exclude cooking technologies acquired by end users with support from government, aid, or philanthropic finance from this calculation; a sensible change given that these households would have been unlikely to have been able to access clean cooking technologies otherwise. For projects that need to demonstrate additionality more comprehensively (and therefore are not eligible for the performance standard), the SBM also clarified that the common practice analysis should be carried out only in the context relevant to the project (i.e., if implemented in an urban setting, only common practices in urban settings should be considered). This is important as it allows projects to compare like-for-like when demonstrating additionality.

A6.4-AMM-005: Energy efficiency measures in household cooking methodology (version 01.0)

This methodology replaces the CDM’s AMS-II.G methodology, and is applicable to improved-efficiency domestic stoves. The SBM adopted the methodology, with an exemption from the requirement to make a downward adjustment to baselines. This exemption was granted recognizing that these cooking devices can provide significant benefits in the form of reduced fuel costs, time savings, and reduced exposure to indoor air pollution (especially for women, children, and vulnerable communities), as well as these communities being particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change whilst having contributed the least to global emissions. As above, the additionality performance standard threshold was also raised from 4.5% to 7.5%.

Similar to the above methodology, A6.4-AMM-005 includes several approaches that underestimate emission reductions achieved. Most relevant is the calculation approach for making deductions to account for reversal risk (as above). Other safeguards include, for example, calculating the baseline via an ambitious benchmark (i.e. based on the efficiency of the top 20% best-performing technologies in the project area), and caps on the portion of devices a project can claim are operational without additional customer support actions or SUMs. SUMs are mandatory on all devices from 01 January 2028,[7] ensuring that stove use is accurately captured (rather than estimated based on sampling).

What the decisions mean for clean cooking

There are a number of ways this could play out for the clean cooking market, and whatever way you look at it, changes are likely to be significant.

• A narrowing path to carbon finance. As outlined above, both approved methodologies include several elements that underestimate emission reductions; meaning less credits per device. The MEP expects that this will require carbon credit prices to rise, and estimates the reversal risk deduction alone will require price increases of up to 74%. One key element the MEP misses in this estimate is the sheer cost of developing, certifying, and issuing carbon credits under the two approved methodologies. Both ask a lot of project developers and third-party verifiers. This will raise certification costs and associated risks, further raising the carbon price a developer would need to make such an investment. For example, the Energy Efficiency Measures in Households (v 1.0) methodology requires that project developers conduct a pre-activity survey to determine the baseline conditions, and a Kitchen Performance Test (KPT) to determine project fuel use. Both are legitimate requirements, but the cost and complexity of carrying these out is often underestimated by investors and buyers alike.
• A boost for the voluntary market? Voluntary carbon standards have tended to follow the precedents set by the UNFCCC. The Gold Standard has already announced that its requirements and methodologies are to be aligned with the Paris Agreement.[8] If Verra follows suit, this will further squeeze the amount of carbon finance reaching the clean cooking sector unless buyers are willing to pay significantly higher prices than they do today. If Verra and other carbon standards decide not to do so, then it is likely that project developers will choose these standards to certify their projects as long as the methodologies remain approved by the Integrity Council for Voluntary Carbon Markets. Expect some heated debates across the voluntary markets on this.
• Institutional stoves likely to prove more economically attractive. Institutional cookstoves are not new to carbon markets and are eligible under CDM (or were), Gold Standard and Verra. However, investors and buyers have historically more familiarity with household programmes, and government priority has largely been on enabling household access to clean cooking. This is starting to change.[9] Institutional stoves are used more intensively than household devices, meaning more carbon credits per device. This makes project management easier for project developers and means less needs to be spent on buying and installing Stove Use Monitors and monitoring fuel use per project device.

What is clear is that, while the new rules seek to underestimate emission reductions in an effort to address environmental integrity concerns, they also risk raising the bar beyond the reach of many clean cooking projects, and the households that carbon finance is intended to serve.

Note: throughout this blog the term ‘clean cooking’ is used as a catch-all phrase to refer to all cooking technologies and fuels, regardless of combustion efficiency, the PM2.5, or carbon monoxide performance of devices.

[1] Clean Cooking Alliance (2026) Clean Cooking NDC Tracker. Available at https://cleancooking.org/ndc-tracker/

[2] Clean Cooking Alliance (2026) Latest Clean Cooking Industry Snapshot Identifies Trends in Investment, Revenue, and Carbon Markets. Available at https://cleancooking.org/news/latest-clean-cooking-industry-snapshot-identifies-trends-in-investment-revenue-and-carbon-markets/

[3] A6.4-MEP016-A04 Information note: Analysis of matters raised by the Supervisory Body at its 22^nd meeting on the “Draft mechanism methodology: Energy efficiency measures in household cooking” (version 01.0), paragraph 63

[4] Standard: Setting the baseline in mechanism methodologies (version 1.0), Appendix 1, paragraph 13. Available at https://unfccc.int/sites/default/files/resource/A6.4-STAN-METH-004.pdf

[5] UNFCCC (2026) Day 3, Part III: 3^rd meeting of the Article 6.4 Supervisory Body, slide 5. Available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiYpBaBBJuQ&list=PLP8bCZEoz1os&index=11

[6] A6.4-MEP016-A04 Information note: Analysis of matters raised by the Supervisory Body at its 22^nd meeting on the “Draft mechanism methodology: Energy efficiency measures in household cooking” (version 01.0)

[7] Note that version 1.0 of the methodology lists two inconsistent dates from which SUMs will be mandatory: 1 January 2028 and 1 January 2029.

[8] Gold Standard (2026) Gold Standard has announced that its requirements and methodologies are to be aligned with the Paris Agreement (PA). Available at https://www.goldstandard.org/publications/paris-agreement-alignment-information

[9] See, for example, the Government of Kenya’s focus on expanding access to clean cooking alternatives in public institutions. Clean Cooking Alliance (2025) Institutional Clean Cooking. Available at https://cleancooking.org/institutional-clean-cooking/