The vast majority of businesses that had to comply with the first reporting deadline under the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) Energy Efficiency Scheme have done so, according to information published by the scheme's administrator last week.
The CRC, which was launched in April last year, was designed to incentivise businesses that use more than 6,000MWh of electricity per year (equivalent to an annual electricity bill of about £500,000) to undertake energy efficiency upgrades.
As a means to evaluate performance, participating organisations are required to submit annual reports about their carbon emissions. The reports are used by the Environment Agency to develop league tables.
These will rank organisations according to their energy efficiency and are now the main positive incentive mechanism under the CRC–following the Government’s decision to scrap its “revenue recycling” of penalty payments earlier this year.
Success or failure
Data released on 16 August by the Environment Agency showed that a total of 4,295 (of an expected 4,549 reports) were submitted on time by businesses participating in the scheme.
This figure equates to just under 95% of CRC registered businesses, which together represent more than 10% of the UK’s total annual carbon emissions.
Companies that did not submit reports by the 29 July deadline could now face an initial fine of £5,000, which will continue to escalate at the rate of £500 a day until a period of 40 working days has passed (26 September 2011).
At this point the accumulated daily rate fine is doubled to £40,000, and participants could be subject to more sanctions—based on the Agency’s assessment.
There are also penalties for under-estimation of emissions under the scheme. Where details previously submitted vary by more than 5% from actual emissions, a fine of £40/t of allocated annual allowances could be imposed.
The first CRC league tables will be published in the Autumn.
Have your say
Meanwhile on 11 August the Environment Agency launched a survey seeking feedback on the administrative time and cost spent by participants in the CRC. Responses are requested by 31 August.
The results will be used to help inform how the CRC is to be simplified in the second phase of the scheme.
Leading by example
In a separate announcement, the Environment Agency announced previously that it had cut its own CO2 emissions by almost a fifth over the last four years, helping it to reduce its overall costs by £6mn a year.
The figures showed that the Agency has reduced office waste by 18%, mileage by over a third and carbon emissions by 17%. It has also reduced the amount of energy used by its buildings by 15% and mains water usage by 18%.
The Environment Agency urged others to follow its lead.
Source : The Informer
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