The Cold Chain Federation (CCF) has announced that businesses participating in the Government’s Climate Change Agreement (CCA) for cold stores have succeeded in meeting the agreement’s target for energy efficiency improvements by the end of 2022.
The cold storage CCA target for the end of 2022 required the participating facilities to improve energy efficiency by 6.67% against a 2018 benchmark. Collectively, the facilities achieved an improvement of 6.735%.
The CCA scheme operates across multiple industries, offering tax benefits to businesses which sign up to energy efficiency targets. The CCF manages the cold storage CCA which saves the cold storage industry more than £10 million each year.
CCF executive director Tom Southall said: “Energy efficiency is a very high priority for cold storage facilities of all sizes, and the industry’s success in meeting this very challenging CCA target reflects strong focus and significant investment.
“For many temperature-controlled warehouse operations, the most straightforward energy efficiency measures have already been implemented so energy efficiency gains are now harder won. But the rewards are very significant both in Climate Change Levy savings and also in reducing sky-high energy bills.
“Securing the extension of the scheme this year was important for our industry, it will help us keep momentum towards net zero while also providing tax savings of more than £10 million every year.”
The CCF campaigned for the cold storage CCA to be extended past 2025, and an extension was confirmed by Government earlier this year, meaning that participating businesses that pass their targets will now benefit from the Climate Change Levy discount through to March 2027. The scheme also opened a new application window in summer 2023 for facilities seeking to join the scheme.
Next targets
The next CCA target for cold stores is to build on the 6.7% energy efficiency improvement achieved by the end of 2022 to reach 10% improvement against the same 2018 baseline by the end of 2024. The CCF stated that there may be a number of changes to the scheme during 2024.
Climate Change Levy reduction rates are due to change on 1st April 2024, and other proposed changes include an increased buyout price (rising from £18 to £25/tC02e), and the possibility of new reporting requirements on energy efficiency measures installed and decarbonisation potential.
Southall added: “Meeting the next target by the end of 2024 will be just as challenging, Cold Chain Federation members can draw on the support we offer including our Practical Guide to Energy Efficiency in Cold Stores; webinars about the CCA and its requirements; our Cold Chain Energy Week webinar series; and our Net Zero Cold Store Project resources.
“We will also be launching a new Cold Store Energy Benchmarking Dashboard in November, a new tool to help our members to better assess energy performance of their facilities and identify the best opportunities to make improvements.”
The CCF’s new Cold Store Energy Benchmarking Dashboard will be launched alongside other new energy efficiency resources in a webinar at 10am on 14th November 2023, as part of the federation’s series of Energy Week events.
