The latest greenhouse gas conversion factors make interesting reading – do they imply that progress on greening the GB electricity grid has plateaued?
The GHG conversion factors are a dataset that the government releases every year to help UK businesses report on their emissions. These give you the carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) for everything from a litre of butane to a mile travelled in a Mini. (They are normally published in late May or early June, but many things have been on hold in the run-up to the election.)
Most large businesses have substantial emissions from purchased electricity; so-called indirect, or Scope 2, emissions. And the conversion factors for these have changed a lot in recent years.
In 2014, one kWh of electricity was considered to be equivalent to 0.49426 kg of CO2e. Ten years on, that figure has fallen to 0.20705. The carbon intensity of the grid has fallen to half what it was in a decade, as our graph shows. But what it also shows is a levelling off in that progress.
Levelling off
Recent years have seen the demise of coal as a generation source, with the UK’s last coal-fired power station set to close at the end of September. A government note explains that the coal phase-out was a key driver of falling carbon intensity in the grid up to now. But now that is nearly finished, the 2024 numbers look very similar to 2023.
This doesn’t mean there have been no changes in the sourcing of UK power. The June 2024 issue of the government’s Energy Trends explains that while the gas trade with Europe is levelling off, imports of electricity reached a record high of 11.2TWh. This is mainly fuelled by French nuclear and Norwegian hydro power. (The UK’s electricity system operator sees import/export connections to other countries as a key tool for managing the intermittency of renewables.) Next year’s GHG conversion factors may show a further fall in carbon intensity.
But if you are a business on a net zero pathway, you can’t rely on the greening of the grid to take care of your Scope 2 emissions. Electrification of heating and industrial processes is a positive step because it means moving away from directly burning fossil fuels, but it can’t be the end of the process. This is where the ENTRNCE Matcher can really help your business move forward. We know that annually issued GHG conversion factors are a blunt instrument for measuring Scope 2 emissions when the mix of energy sources in the grid is always changing. The Matcher captures a much more accurate picture by reporting the sources on a half-hourly basis. This allows your organisation to align periods of high energy use with peak renewable output, where possible. The Matcher can tell you exactly how well you’re doing on that front.
Improve your Clean Energy Score
The Matcher also offers a modelling functionality so you can explore ways to increase the percentage of renewably sourced energy your organisation uses. Would investing in more solar make sense, or would battery storage be better? Should you time-shift key processes to the evening or early morning? When should you charge up your EV fleet? The Matcher can offer you answers before you actually take any big steps, then continue to provide your Clean Energy Score so you can keep track of progress.
Grid decarbonisation will happen; we just don’t know how soon. The previous government was aiming to decarbonise the power sector by 2035. The new UK government has moved the target forwards to 2030 as part of its ambitious energy agenda, but there are multiple barriers to tackle first. Large organisations with their own ambitious targets should not wait for government action. The granular data offered by the Matcher lets you take control of your energy sourcing right now.
Book your free one-hour demo of the Matcher, and find out your true Clean Energy Score – and how you can improve it.
