Carbon-Free Chronicles May 2025: the essential round up of news and reports relating to 24/7 clean energy

What we’re reading

GHG Protocol Scope 2 update: what you need to know

• Killian Daly, Executive Director of EnergyTag, is a member of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol Scope 2 Technical Working Group (TWG), contributing to the process of updating the Scope 2 guidance. He shares some takeaways on the emerging proposal.
• First, he notes the GHG Protocol is an accounting standard to ensure accurate emissions disclosure. It is not a target setting or grading standard and will not require any company to be “zero emissions” or “24/7 carbon-free” by a given date.
• The discussions are heading in the direction of dual reporting of both location- and market-based Scope 2 inventory. There is a potential recommendation or requirement for a third “project accounting” number outside of the Scope 2 inventory.
• Within the discussions on the market-based methodology, granular accounting is emerging as the preferred direction of travel.

SmartestEnergy getting ready for future changes to GHG reporting

• Owen Moulton, Strategic Development Manager at SmartestEnergy UK, puts GHG reporting into action. In his blog about GHG reporting changes, he highlights that annual averages and vague certificates just don’t cut it anymore when it comes to customer reporting. Energy buyers now expect carbon claims to reflect physical reality.
• Traceable, time- and location-specific energy data is fast becoming essential. Not only for compliance but also for building trust. Buyers must act now to future-proof procurement strategies, embracing tools and partnerships that offer full transparency and traceability. SmartestEnergy offers a Traceable Renewable Supply tariff going in that direction.

Taiwan a step closer to sub-hourly matched T-RECs

• The Taiwan Renewable Energy Certificates (T-RECs) have the capability for sub-hourly tracking, as the system was built for granular auditing and reporting. Certificates are currently issued on a monthly basis, but the data infrastructure is in place to support granular certificates.
• The T-REC system enables Taiwan-based global enterprises and large international businesses to meet voluntary reporting or supply chain requirements, while establishing a renewable energy certification that is highly reliable.
• This paper in Science Direct, penned by Tze Luen Lin, Kuan Ting Chen, and Hen-Haw Chen, reviews the success of T-RECs, most notably the government-led initiatives, the voluntary nature of the programme, the design of bundled certificates, and their integration with the national greenhouse gas registry.

What we've written

Storage for everyone: how to scale hourly matching scores

• We published methodology on how to use storage in renewable energy matching claims, covering how to deal with losses, encourage a FIFO methodology for allocations, which data to align on, and how to audit the claims.

Key insights from our clean energy procurement workshop

• Our May workshop, hosted with CMS, brought together close to 70 industry leaders in the UK to discuss the challenges and opportunities of granular procurement.
• We commented on the rise of new supply tariffs focused on ‘hybrid’ or ‘24/7’ PPAs, in essence giving customers traceability and temporal matching. Suppliers and energy buyers in the room shared their experience with such tariffs, discussing how this necessary evolution is a progressive journey.

Insights from CEBA Connect Spring Summit 2025

• Despite uncertainty around energy and climate policies, such as the possible repeal of the IRA, corporate buyers are continuing to pursue clean energy goals. The event celebrated CEBA members surpassing 100 GW of clean energy procurement since 2014.
• Corporate players in the room discussed various procurement strategies. A few that stood out:

1. Smaller buyers exploring pooling together their load to procure jointly
2. Larger corporates procuring RECs on behalf of their supply chains
3. Pursuing clean firm energy supply, with geothermal and nuclear discussed

Meet us in the coming weeks!

• Ariel (Smith) Bookmyer at the American Public Power Association (APPA) in New Orleans, June 8-11th
• Pal Habsburg-Lothringen at ETCSEE - Energy Trading Central & South Eastern Europe in Vienna, June 11-12th
• Camille Lamb and Bruno Menu at Energy Storage Ireland in Dublin, June 26th
• Bruno Menu and Eleonore Lazat at Forum EUROP'ENERGIES in Paris, July 1st