About
About Valence Four
Valence Four is an independent carbon rating agency. We exist to bring rigour, evidence, and clear quality signals to carbon markets.
Our Mission
Carbon markets work when participants can trust the ratings.
The voluntary carbon market has grown rapidly, but integrity concerns have held back institutional participation. Buyers struggle to distinguish high-quality credits from poor ones. Issuers with genuinely rigorous credits cannot differentiate themselves.
Valence Four was founded to solve this problem. We provide independent, evidence-based ratings that give every market participant - buyers, developers, exchanges, regulators - a reliable quality signal they can act on.
Our credit ratings
The Name
Four bonds. One standard.
Carbon is unique in chemistry: it forms exactly four covalent bonds, creating stable, structured molecules. We took this as our founding metaphor. Every carbon credit should be evaluated against four dimensions of integrity - and only when all four bonds are strong is a credit truly stable.
01
Additionality
The emissions reductions would not have occurred without the project.
02
Permanence
The stored carbon is protected from reversal over the long term.
03
Verification
An independent third party has confirmed the claimed reductions.
04
Co-benefits
The project delivers credible social and environmental co-benefits.
Founding Principles
Built from the ground up on three commitments.
Evidence before influence
Ratings are based on documented evidence and technical review. Commercial relationships do not determine rating outcomes.
Science over convention
We do not defer to registry labels simply because they exist. We independently assess whether the underlying evidence is robust and apply conservative adjustments where it is not.
Clarity with discipline
Rating outputs are clear and useful, while detailed internal evaluation standards remain confidential.