This figure illustrates the structure of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Scheme (GGAS) and its key participants.

Structure of GGAS and its key participants

To understand how GGAS works, it helps to think of the benchmark participants as creating the demand for certificates, and accredited abatement certificate providers as providing the supply of certificates to meet demand.

Accredited abatement certificate providers register certificates on the GGAS registry. If these are tradeable certificates (ie NGACs) then they are available for sale either by way of bilateral sales, through brokers or through other trading platforms. The registry is not a trading platform and the Scheme Administrator does not get involved in the sales of certificates. In order to purchase certificates, you must first register yourself (if you are not already an abatement certificate provider or a benchmark participant) on the GGAS Registry so that any certificate sale and transfer can be recorded. The registry records any change of ownership of certificates.

Audits are undertaken by members of the audit panel and are commissioned by both the Scheme Administrator (to conduct pre-accreditation audits, pre-registration audits and certificate creation audits) and the Compliance Regulator, for compliance. Benchmark statement audits are initiated by the benchmark participant, but must be approved by the Compliance Regulator.

Both the Scheme Administrator and the Compliance Regulator report to the Minister for Energy on the performance of GGAS.

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