The Carbon Reduction Commitment

UK companies and organisations with substantial electricity consumption are slowly coming to terms with the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) program – the UK government's mandatory trading CO2 emissions trading scheme -- and those that haven't are running out of time to do so.  This note aims to summarise the key features of the CRC program, to help identify whether the CRC program applies to your organisation, and steps you will need to take if the CRC program applies to your organisation.

Who Will Be Affected?

The CRC program is, in essence, a cap-and-trade CO2 emissions trading scheme for large electricity consumers in the UK.  The program applies to both the public and private sectors, but is only designed to capture emissions in the UK (see references to foreign parent companies below).  The program is also designed to work in parallel with existing carbon emissions schemes (see below), aiming to capture those large scale consumers (e.g. utilities) not