Commission Regulation (EU) No 600/2012Show full title

Article 27 Verification report

1. Based on the information collected during the verification, the verifier shall issue a verification report to the operator or aircraft operator on each emission report or tonne kilometre report that was subject to verification. The verification report shall include at least one of the following findings:

(a) the report is verified as satisfactory;

(b) the operator’s or aircraft operator’s report contains material misstatements that were not corrected before issuing the verification report;

(c) the scope of verification is too limited pursuant to Article 28 and the verifier could not obtain sufficient evidence to issue a verification opinion with reasonable assurance that the report is free from material misstatements;

(d) non-conformities, individually or combined with other non-conformities, provide insufficient clarity and prevent the verifier from stating with reasonable assurance that the operator’s or aircraft operator’s report is free from material misstatements.

For the purposes of point (a) of the first subparagraph, the operator’s or aircraft operator’s report may be verified as satisfactory only where the operator’s or aircraft operator’s report is free from material misstatements.

2. The operator or aircraft operator shall submit the verification report to the competent authority together with the operator’s or aircraft operator’s report concerned.

3. The verification report shall at least contain the following elements:

(a) the name of the operator or aircraft operator that was subject to verification;

(b) the objectives of the verification;

(c) the scope of the verification;

(d) a reference to the operator’s or aircraft operator’s report that has been verified;

(e) the criteria used to verify the operator’s or aircraft operator’s report, including the permit, where applicable, and versions of the monitoring plan approved by the competent authority as well as the period of validity for each monitoring plan;

(f) aggregated emissions or tonne-kilometres per activity referred to in Annex I of Directive 2003/87/EC and per installation or aircraft operator;

(g) the reporting period subject to verification;

(h) the responsibilities of the operator or aircraft operator, the competent authority and the verifier;

(i) the verification opinion statement;

(j) a description of any identified misstatements and non-conformities that were not corrected before the issuance of the verification report;

(k) the dates on which site visits were carried out and by whom;

(l) information on whether any site visits were waived as well as the reasons for waiving these site visits;

(m) any issues of non-compliance with Regulation (EU) No 601/2012, which have become apparent during the verification;

(n) where approval by the competent authority cannot be obtained in time for the method used to complete the data gap pursuant to the last subparagraph of Article 18(1), a confirmation whether the method used is conservative and whether it does or does not lead to material misstatements;

(o) where the verifier has observed changes to the capacity, activity level and operation of the installation, which might have an impact on the installation’s allocation of emission allowances and which have not been reported to the competent authority by 31 December of the reporting period in accordance with Article 24(1) of Decision 2011/278/EU, a description of those changes and related remarks;

(p) where applicable, recommendations for improvements;

(q) the names of the EU ETS lead auditor, the independent reviewer and, where applicable, the EU ETS auditor and the technical expert that were involved in the verification of the operator’s or aircraft operator’s report;

(r) the date and signature by an authorised person on behalf of the verifier, including his name.

4. The verifier shall describe the misstatements and non-conformities in sufficient detail in the verification report to allow the operator or aircraft operator as well as the competent authority to understand the following:

(a) the size and nature of the misstatement or non-conformity;

(b) why the misstatement has material effect, or not;

(c) to which element of the operator’s or aircraft operator’s report the misstatement or to what element of the monitoring plan the non-conformity refers to.

5. Where a Member State requires the verifier to submit information on the verification process in addition to the elements described in paragraph 3 and that information is not necessary to understand the verification opinion, the operator or aircraft operator may, for efficiency reasons, submit that additional information to the competent authority separately from the verification report at an alternative date, but no later than 15 May of the same year.