Frequently Asked Questions

Expand All [+]

1. What is the North American Renewables Registry™? -
   Answer [+]

The North American Renewables Registry provides an easy-to-use, Web-based platform trusted to create, track, and manage renewable energy certificate (REC) origination for clean generation facilities and states not covered by one of the existing APX regional market solutions.

All certificates issued and held in the North American Renewables Registry are tracked using unique serial numbers. Registry Account Holders can transfer certificates to other Account Holders and retire certificates. The Registry's data infrastructure prevents double-counting of certificates and provides public reports and a full audit trail of all transactions, to ensure the integrity of the certificates issued and held in the Registry.

2. How does the North American Renewables Registry relate to other regional REC market systems? - Answer [+]

The primary role of the Registry is to provide REC origination for clean generation facilities located in states and provinces not covered by the five current regional systems powered by APX – NEPOOL-GIS, PJM-GATS, Texas RECs, M-RETS, and WREGIS. The purpose is to complement the existing market systems and provide complete North American coverage for renewable energy markets.

3. Is the North American Renewable Registry available for state compliance programs? - Answer [+]

Yes. For states that are considering a REC tracking and management mechanism, the North American Renewables Registry tracks renewable energy generation and enables compliance with mandatory state and provincial renewable portfolio standards (RPS) and objectives.

4. What benefits does the North American Renewables Registry provide? - Answer [+]

With the Registry, all participants in the North American renewable energy markets - regardless of location - are now able to take advantage of a trusted infrastructure to help manage their role in the market. Benefits include:

• Provides easy to use, cost-effective, Web-based system
• Ensures highest levels of transparency, quality, security, accountability and protection against double counting
• Delivers full documentation, public reports & detailed audit trails for oversight
• Extends to meet specific state requirements
• Drives continued growth of clean energy generation and usage
• Offers proven, rapid client service and support
• Tracks eligibility for voluntary programs such as Green-e Energy, Green-e Climate, the US EPA Green Power Partnership and the Low-Impact Hydropower Institute.

For Corporations: Companies can use the Registry to manage renewable energy certificates and substantiation of environmental claims. It provides a way to demonstrate environmental and climate change leadership through the use of renewable energy. In addition, companies benefit from the ability to easily track and manage their portfolios related to RECs and carbon avoidance with a full audit trail.

For Retailers and Brokers: The use of the Registry can enhance the visibility, integrity, trust, and quality perception for clients, while at the same time reducing the cost of manual and paper processes to track RECs and documents.

For Utility Green Pricing Programs: The Registry enables increased administrative efficiency and public transparency in the management of Green Pricing Programs for states and utilities. Utilities can set up "sub-accounts" in the registry for each program.  RECs can be transferred into each sub-account - monthly, quarterly, and have full transparency, audit trail, and public visibility (to the extent desired.)

Clean Generators: The Registry provides generators with the ability to capture environmental value for clean generation. It creates a platform that places a dollar value on environmental benefits and allows clean and green generators to access an additional revenue stream or "green" premium.

Regulators: The Registry enables government agencies and regulators to verify compliance with RPS, Environmental Portfolio Standard (EPS), and state purchase requirements. The complete audit trail ensures oversight capabilities. Additionally, the system provides data for environmental disclosure labels and allows for verification of green product claims.

Utilities: Utilities use the Registry for RPS reporting and compliance that also provides administrative and cost efficiencies. The Registry offers unbiased third-party verification and ensures data confidentiality.

5. How does the North American Renewables Registry work? -
   Answer [+]

The Registry stores and publicly displays renewable energy generator and project information. The Registry also facilitates independent third-party certification and auditing of renewable energy generator projects as well as certificate retirement records.

Once a renewable energy generator project is registered and appropriate certificate documentation and attestations are uploaded, the Registry administrator will deposit into the project developer's account one certificate for each megawatt-hour (MWh) of renewable energy generated. The generator or project owner then uses the Registry to transfer the certificates to another account holder or retire the certificates within the Registry. Account Holders receiving certificates from a project developer use the Registry to retire the certificates or to transfer the certificates to another account holder.

The Registry ensures the integrity of the certificates through a transaction-based data structure designed to prevent double-counting and provide full audit trail capabilities. Additionally, the Registry provides numerous publicly accessible reports that list Registry Account Holders, the status of generators and projects, and information about both issued and retired certificates.

6. What is the infrastructure that supports the North American Renewables Registry? - Answer [+]

The North American Renewables Registry is powered by the most widely used, highest volume, and technically advanced environmental market infrastructure that has been developed over nearly a decade. With more than 2 billion certificates under management, APX market infrastructure sets the standard for ensuring integrity in environmental markets. As an independent and trusted provider of infrastructure solutions, APX is fully committed to the highest market transparency and a level playing field for all market participants and stakeholders. We do not make markets or take principal positions in environmental transactions, and are not a bank, brokerage or marketer.

7. How does the North American Renewables Registry verify renewable energy generation? - Answer [+]

Every generator has to provide documentation substantiating the generation of renewable energy. The documentation requirements include metering records, official filings with the Energy Information Administration as well as independent reporting from qualified third parties. No certificates are issued until such documentation has been presented to the Registry administrator.

8. How does the North American Renewables Registry support “carbon neutral” and green claims? - Answer [+]

Many companies purchase renewable energy credits as a basis for carbon neutral and green claims.  The Registry has implemented two methods for calculating the avoided carbon emissions benefits of renewable energy:

(1) Green-e Climate Method – based on NERC region and fuel type (solar, wind, hydro etc.)

(2) U.S. EPA Climate Leaders Method – based on e-grid sub-regions and fuel type

The Registry enables companies to purchase and retire RECs and their avoided carbon attributes for voluntary claims.

9. How is the North American Renewables Registry helpful to the environment? - Answer [+]

Many companies purchase renewable energy credits as a basis for carbon neutral and green claims.  The Registry has implemented two methods for calculating the avoided carbon emissions benefits of renewable energy:

(1) Green-e Climate Method – based on NERC region and fuel type (solar, wind, hydro etc.)

(2) U.S. EPA Climate Leaders Method – based on e-grid sub-regions and fuel type

The Registry enables companies to purchase and retire RECs and their avoided carbon attributes for voluntary claims.

10. How is the North American Renewables Registry helpful to the environment? - Answer [+]

The Registry provides an independent platform to issue, track, transfer, and retire environmental certificates, which facilitates third-party audit and verification of the certificates. It also ensures that certificates have not been double counted or double sold. Providing this credibility and transparency to environmental certificates builds market confidence that leads to increased purchases of environmental certificates and increased investment in renewable energy generation projects.

11. Who can use the Registry? - Answer [+]

Anyone can have an account in the North American Renewables Registry. Obtaining a Registry account requires completing the account registration process and paying the account registration fees.

12. Who can register a renewable energy generator project? - Answer [+]

A renewable energy project can be registered by anyone who has legal title to the renewable energy certificates. Typically this would be a generator owner or a project developer.

13. What renewable energy generation technology does the North American Renewables Registry accept? - Answer [+]

The Registry accepts renewable energy generation technologies that are recognized by an industry leading standards and organizations such as Green-e, World Resources Institute, and US EPA Climate Leaders.

14. Can I register certificates that I purchased from a renewable energy generator? - Answer [+]

Yes, this will be allowed on a retroactive basis if the generator's RECs are not being tracked in any other registry. The Registry allows Account Holders to register such certificates when Account Holders provide comprehensive documentation proving ownership and certificate sale history. This pedigree documentation is uploaded in the Registry and is always linked to the certificate serial number regardless of the number of times a certificate is transferred.

15. Does the North American Renewables Registry include energy efficiency certificates? - Answer [+]

APX is closely following the development of energy efficiency standards and state programs and has the infrastructure ready to provide a market solution that ensures trust and transparency for these new environmental commodities.

16. Is the North American Renewables Registry an exchange? Can I trade RECs on the North American Renewables Registry? - Answer [+]

The North American Renewables Registry is not an exchange. An exchange matches buyers and sellers in a transaction, and the Registry does not do this. Buyers and sellers may identify each other using reports and public documents provided by the Registry, but deal negotiation and financial transactions happen outside the Registry. Once the financial transaction occurs, the seller uses the Registry to transfer certificates into the buyer’s account.  So the Registry is the system of record to complete the physical transaction, perform the transfer, and reflect the sale.

17. Can RECs from other registries be transferred into or out of the North American Renewables Registry? - Answer [+]

Currently, the North American Renewables Registry tracks certificates originating in the Registry, however APX is working to enable the ability to transfer RECs from one registry to another. There is no technological barrier to doing so.

18. What type of account should I select to register? - Answer [+]

The General Account is for users who will participate in the Registry as asset owners, brokers, marketers and traders. This account type provides the full functionality to register renewable assets, have RECs issued in your account, transferred to your account as well as the ability to transfer RECs to other account holders.

The Generator Account is for users who will participate in the Registry primarily as asset owners. This account type provides functionality to register renewable assets and transfer RECs to other account holders. A Generator Account cannot accept incoming REC transfers.
 
The Retail Purchaser Account is for users who are buying RECs to retire for their own use. This account type provides functionality to accept REC transfers from other account holders and to register renewable assets.  A Retail Purchaser Account cannot transfer RECs to other accounts.

The Qualified Reporting Entity Account is for entities that are qualified to provide data for renewable energy assets registered in the Registry. This type of account cannot hold RECs or register assets.

The Program Administrator Account is provided to certification and compliance programs to verify eligibilities related to the specific program. This account type can also be used by certification and compliance programs to verify compliance with certain mandates and policies. This type of account cannot hold RECs or register assets.

More details on the different account types can be found in the Operating Rules and Terms of Use.

19. Can I request changes to the Terms of Use? - Answer [+]

The Terms of Use is a standard document common to all users of the Registry. This document cannot be customized for each user as all changes to the Terms of Use will need to be applicable to all current Registry subscribers. APX has a high threshold for making changes to this document, although we will consider on a semi-annual basis recommendations for improvements which will benefit the Registry and its users.

20. What information is public? - Answer [+]

The North American Renewable Registry strikes a balance between respecting the privacy of certain account holders and providing the public with complete Registry transparency. As a result, the Registry provides a number of publicly accessible reports that provide comprehensive information about the renewable projects without requiring account holders to disclose their presence or their credit inventory. The reports provide comprehensive information about all renewable energy projects. Account holders can elect not to be listed or identified on any public report. An identifier number will be listed instead.

21. Who can retire credits? Can I retire my own? - Answer [+]

Any account holder in possession of RECs, including their own, can retire the credits.

22. Who is APX Inc.? - Answer [+]

APX Inc. is the leading infrastructure provider for environmental and energy markets in renewable energy and greenhouse gases including renewable energy certificates (RECs), energy efficiency and conservation certificates, carbon offset certificates such as voluntary emissions reductions (VERs), and greenhouse gas emission allowances. With a singular focus on providing trust, transparency, and integrity for environmental markets, the company is the solution of choice for every major renewable energy market in North America and greenhouse gas markets worldwide. APX provides 24/7 support of environmental markets through secure, fully staffed and geographically redundant data centers. Users of these systems include all key market participants including brokers, corporations, generators, NGOs and government organizations. In 2009, more than 1300 companies across the US and internationally will rely on APX for integrity in environmental markets.

APX also provides technology, strategic consulting, and expert operational services to assist wholesale power market participants reduce costs and improve performance in power scheduling, settlement, market operations, system operations support, and demand response programs.

23. How do I get more information?

For more information, please contact us