Spot and Forward Transactions on Greentruth

Every QET acquisition on Greentruth runs through one of two spot and forward transactions workflows: a spot transaction transfers a verified Quantified Emissions Token from a producer's wallet to yours today; a forward transaction reserves a producer's not-yet-minted production with a blockchain-based Reservation Token that converts to a verified QET on mint. Both paths settle through a Greentruth-issued T+5 invoice. This page explains the choice, the mechanics, and what the buyer holds at each step.

Spot or forward, in one paragraph. A spot transaction moves an existing, fully-verified QET from the producer's wallet to the buyer's wallet immediately. A forward transaction issues a non-tradable Reservation Token (surfaced in the UI as fQET / Forward) on Hedera Hashgraph that represents the buyer's binding claim on a producer's forecasted batch; when the producer mints that batch, the Reservation Token is burned and the corresponding verified QET routes automatically to the buyer's wallet. In both modes, Greentruth issues a T+5 invoice to the buyer; the QETs unlock for transfer or retirement (direct or by proxy) once payment is received and recorded on the platform.

Use a spot transaction when the QETs you need are already minted and listed in the registry. Use a forward transaction when you need to lock in supply from a specific producer before that production has been verified and minted — typically because you have a multi-period reporting obligation, an annual compliance deadline, or a long-dated SBTi or CDP commitment.

A spot transaction on Greentruth is the immediate, on-chain transfer of an existing minted QET from a producer's wallet to a buyer's wallet. The token already carries verified emissions attributes, methodology version, MRV tier, and an accredited third-party verifier under ISO 14064-3 reasonable assurance — acquisition does not change any of those values.

The buyer flow is four steps:

• Discover. Browse the Greentruth Registry and filter by commodity (QET-NG, QET-RNG, QET-CCS, QET-ELEC), basin, carbon intensity, methodology version, MRV tier, and producer-carried grades.
• Add to order. Open the project / vintage detail view and add minted QETs to the order via the Add to Order modal.
• Confirm and check out. Review the Current Order view; lock the invoice on the Checkout page.
• Delivery and settlement. QETs transfer from the producer's wallet to the buyer's wallet in locked state on Hedera Hashgraph. Greentruth issues a T+5 invoice to the buyer (payable within 5 days). When payment is received and recorded on the platform, the QETs unlock — available to transfer, retire directly, or retire by proxy on behalf of a third party.

After unlock, the buyer holds an Environmental Attribute Certificate (where applicable) plus the underlying QETs in machine-readable form. The acquisition record is part of the audit trail an accredited third-party verifier or internal assurance team can reconstruct end-to-end. Programmatic acquisition via API is also supported.

A forward transaction on Greentruth is a binding reservation against a producer's forecasted batch, settled when that batch is actually minted. No QET exists at the time of the reservation. Instead, the platform issues a Reservation Token on Hedera that represents the buyer's claim — when the producer mints the verified batch later, the Reservation Token is burned and the corresponding verified QET is routed automatically to the buyer's wallet.

The buyer flow is six steps:

• Discover the forward listing. The producer registers a forecasted batch (facility, commodity, expected token amount, expected carbon intensity, expected delivery date, variance bands). The forward appears in the Registry, visually distinguished from minted QETs as fQET / Forward.
• Read the variance bands. Each forward carries three buyer-visible variance bands set by the seller — amount (%), carbon intensity (%), and delivery date (days). These become part of the binding contract at checkout.
• Check out. Add the forward to an order. The checkout page shows the QET unit price (payable on delivery) and confirms the reservation fee is $0.
• Reservation Token delivered. A Reservation Token transfers from the producer's wallet to your wallet on Hedera. It appears under Pending Transactions with the expected total on delivery.
• Producer mints, conversion executes. When the producer's verified batch is minted, the platform burns the Reservation Token and routes the corresponding verified QET into your wallet (in locked state). If the actual minted volume, CI, or delivery date falls outside the variance bands for a given timeframe, the buyer can cancel that timeframe's automatic purchase from either the Greentruth or Earn interface.
• T+5 invoice, unlock, use. Greentruth issues a T+5 invoice at delivery (payable within 5 days). When payment is received and recorded on the platform, the verified QETs unlock — available to transfer, retire directly, or retire by proxy.

Forwards on Greentruth today are best suited to QET-RNG and biomethane, where supply is constrained and buyers commonly contract production months ahead of mint.

Forward production is forecasted, not certain. Three variance bands set by the producer at the time of listing make the buyer's acceptable range explicit and part of the binding contract:

• Expected amount variation (%) — the maximum acceptable shortfall below the expected token amount. Protects the buyer from over-promise.
• Expected carbon intensity variation (%) — the maximum acceptable upward drift from the expected CI. Protects the buyer's reporting integrity.
• Expected delivery date variation (days) — the maximum acceptable slippage past the expected delivery date. Protects the buyer's reporting period alignment.

If the producer's actual mint stays within all three bands for a given timeframe, the verified QETs are delivered to the buyer's wallet and invoiced at the agreed unit price. If any band is exceeded for a given timeframe, the buyer can cancel that timeframe's automatic purchase — from either the Greentruth or Earn interface. The Reservation Token does not auto-expire.

When multiple buyers have reserved against the same producer's forecasted batch, allocation runs first-come-first-serve against the producer's registered forecast, capped at 100% of the forecast. Earlier reservations have a higher chance of being filled in full.

Both spot and forward Greentruth-originated transactions settle on a T+5 invoice issued from the Greentruth platform to the buyer. There is no third-party payment processor in the loop at this stage.

The trigger point differs by mode. For spot, the invoice is issued at checkout. For forward, the invoice is issued at delivery of the verified QETs (after the Reservation Token has converted on mint). In both cases:

• The delivered QETs sit in the buyer's wallet in locked state.
• The invoice is payable within 5 business days from issuance.
• When the buyer's payment is received and recorded on the platform, the QETs unlock.
• Unlocked QETs are available to transfer, retire directly, or retire by proxy on behalf of a third party.

Payment for paid QETs flows to the energy producer or operator that issued the tokens. Greentruth does not mark up the underlying free GHG-Protocol-aligned default calculation; platform fees apply only where paid lines are part of the order.

Once a verified QET is unlocked in the buyer's wallet, three actions are available:

• Transfer. Move the QET to another wallet (subject to commercial terms). The full provenance chain — producer, batch, methodology version, verifier, MRV tier — moves with it.
• Direct retirement. Retire the QET against your own reporting period and entity. Retirement is irrevocable and recorded on Hedera, anchoring the GHG accounting claim.
• Proxy retirement. Retire the QET on behalf of a third party (for example, a downstream customer, an affiliate, or a counterparty fulfilling its own reporting obligation). The retirement record names the third party as the beneficiary while the proxy buyer is identified in the audit trail.

The same token cannot be retired twice — the platform enforces double-counting prevention at the registry layer. See how retirement actually works for the full retirement flow.

Spot and forward transactions on Greentruth are both designed to satisfy contractual-instrument quality criteria under the GHG Protocol, California LCFS pathway integrity expectations, and the documentation requirements emerging under EU Methane Regulation Article 27 and FuelEU Maritime. The deployed mechanism preserves three integrity properties:

• Single-mint enforcement. Every retirable token traces to one verified mint event; the Reservation Token is burned at conversion, not re-issued.
• Verifier of record on every token. Methodology version, reference dataset version, and accredited third-party verifier under ISO 14064-3 reasonable assurance are recorded at mint and carried through transfer and retirement.
• Immutable audit trail. Every reservation, allocation, conversion, transfer, invoice, and retirement is recorded on Hedera Consensus Service. An auditor reconstructs the chain-of-custody from physical production through buyer retirement without leaving the registry.

Further reading: Hedera Token Service documentation · GHG Protocol market-based accounting guidance.