System Overview
What is The Granular Registry?
The Granular Registry is an advanced digital platform designed to facilitate the issuance, trading, and retirement of Granular Certificates (GCs), enabling real-time energy tracking and verification. By providing a standardized and transparent system for managing energy attributes at an hourly level, the registry supports energy buyers, producers, and storage operators in achieving 24/7 carbon-free energy goals.
A Trusted Tracking System for Granular Certificates
At its core, The Granular Registry acts as a trusted ledger for GCs, ensuring that each unit of renewable energy generation is accurately time-stamped, securely issued, and verifiably transferred or retired. The registry provides:
Issuance of GCs: Converts renewable energy production data into uniquely identifiable, time-based certificates that reflect the environmental attributes of generation.
Trading & Transfer Capabilities: Enables direct peer-to-peer transactions and marketplace integration for voluntary and compliance markets.
Retirement for Claims & Reporting: Supports corporate sustainability disclosures, carbon accounting frameworks, and regulatory compliance by preventing double counting and enabling transparent claim verification.
Seamless Compatibility with Existing EAC Registries
The Granular Registry is designed to integrate with existing Energy Attribute Certificate (EAC) systems, ensuring interoperability with widely used certificate tracking platforms such as:
Guarantees of Origin (GO) in Europe
Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) in North America
International RECs (I-RECs) in global voluntary markets
Through API-based connectivity, The Granular Registry can either complement or be embedded within existing registries, allowing EAC issuers to adopt hourly tracking without disrupting their current infrastructure. This compatibility ensures that GCs enhance, rather than replace, established market mechanisms, providing an evolutionary pathway toward more granular energy tracking.
Compliance with the EnergyTag Standard
The Granular Registry operates in full alignment with the EnergyTag Standard, the leading global framework for hourly renewable energy certification. Compliance with this standard ensures that:
GCs are issued with a maximum time granularity of one hour.
The registry follows EnergyTag’s defined processes for certificate issuance, trading, and retirement.
Data integrity and security are maintained through best practices in digital registry management.
By adhering to the EnergyTag Standard, The Granular Registry provides a high-integrity solution that enables energy buyers to confidently procure and report renewable energy on an hourly basis, paving the way for 24/7 carbon-free energy adoption across industries and markets.
Key Functionalities
The Granular Registry is designed to facilitate the issuance, trading, transfer, and retirement of Granular Certificates (GCs) with a high level of integrity and interoperability. It provides a real-time energy attribute tracking system that supports renewable energy buyers, generators, and storage operators in achieving 24/7 carbon-free energy procurement.
GC Issuance: Converting EACs into GCs
The Granular Registry enables the conversion of traditional EACs into GCs, ensuring that renewable energy attributes are tracked and matched to actual generation at an hourly level. GC issuance follows the EnergyTag Standard, which defines three primary configurations for integrating GCs with existing Energy Attribute Certificate (EAC) systems:
Configuration 1: GCs as an Evolution of Existing EAC Systems
The existing EAC Issuer (e.g., a national registry) directly issues GCs instead of traditional RECs, integrating hourly time stamps from metered generation data.
This configuration ensures seamless regulatory compliance by maintaining consistency with the current EAC governance framework while introducing higher granularity.
Configuration 2: GCs as a Supplement to Existing EACs
GCs are issued alongside existing EACs by a third-party registry (e.g., The Granular Registry), ensuring that renewable energy attributes are still tracked at an hourly level.
This approach prevents double counting by linking GC issuance to the original REC cancellation while maintaining compatibility with EAC markets.
Configuration 3: GCs Based on Canceled EACs
GCs are issued only after an REC has been canceled, ensuring that the attributes of the energy are not claimed twice within an energy market.
This configuration is useful for markets where existing EAC registries cannot directly support hourly tracking, enabling a transparent transition to 24/7 energy procurement.
Through these three configurations, The Granular Registry ensures that GCs can be seamlessly integrated into diverse renewable energy markets, providing flexibility for buyers, sellers, and regulators.
GC Trading & Transfer: Public Retirement Table & Market Integration
To support market adoption and ensure transaction integrity, The Granular Registry provides:
A Public Retirement Table:
Displays all retired GCs, ensuring transparency in corporate energy claims and preventing double counting.
Allows stakeholders to verify whether a GC has been used for sustainability reporting or regulatory compliance.
API Integration with Marketplaces & REC Management Software:
Supports automated GC trading, transfers, and retirements through API-based connectivity with existing EAC platforms and hourly energy marketplaces.
Allows corporate buyers, traders, and energy managers to seamlessly integrate GC data into their existing sustainability tracking systems.
Ensures real-time visibility into GC transactions, enhancing liquidity in hourly renewable energy markets.
By providing robust trading and transfer capabilities, The Granular Registry enhances the value of GCs, enabling efficient clean energy procurement in voluntary and compliance markets.
Storage Tracking: Time-Shifting GCs
The Granular Registry includes comprehensive tracking for energy storage, allowing battery operators to issue GCs for stored and discharged energy while maintaining transparency in time-shifting renewable energy attributes.
Storage Charge and Discharge Records (SCRs & SDRs):
Storage Charge Records (SCRs): Track when energy is stored, ensuring that only verified renewable energy sources contribute to storage.
Storage Discharge Records (SDRs): Track when stored energy is released, enabling the issuance of Storage Discharge GCs (SD-GCs) with time-stamped attributes.
This process ensures that time-shifted energy retains its original environmental attributes, supporting accurate carbon accounting and 24/7 energy tracking.
Enabling New Revenue Streams for Storage Operators:
Storage operators can monetize stored renewable energy by issuing GCs for discharged power, increasing the economic value of flexible clean energy delivery.
Allows corporate buyers to claim time-shifted renewable energy that aligns with their sustainability goals and real-time electricity consumption needs.
By integrating storage tracking capabilities, The Granular Registry supports the transition to a fully decarbonized power grid, where renewable energy can be effectively time-shifted and optimized to meet real-time demand.
Summary
With seamless GC issuance, trading integration, and advanced storage tracking, The Granular Registry provides a future-proof solution for energy buyers, producers, and storage operators looking to participate in the 24/7 carbon-free energy market. Through compliance with the EnergyTag Standard, it ensures that hourly renewable energy tracking is both transparent and scalable, supporting the next generation of clean energy procurement.
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