GHGプロトコルの不確実性が太陽光企業PPA市場を冷やしているとRenewabl CEOが語る

Corporate PPA volumes fell 10% in 2025, and Renewabl CEO JP Cerda says uncertainty around pending scope 2 accounting changes are causing some buyers to hold off. A shift to hourly matching should see battery storage center stage. The post GHG Protocol uncertainty is cooling solar corporate PPA market, says Renewabl CEO appeared first on pv magazine Global . Corporate PPA volumes fell 10% in 2025, and Renewabl CEO JP Cerda says uncertainty around pending scope 2 accounting changes are causing some buyers to hold off. A shift to hourly matching should see battery storage center stage. The post GHG Protocol uncertainty is cooling solar corporate PPA market, says Renewabl CEO appeared first on pv magazine Global . Greenhouse Gas Protocol revision may be cooling demand for solar corporate PPA deals, but there is a chance deal volume will spring back when more certainty returns. Corporate PPA deals were down 10% in 2025 according to BloombergNEF , and JP Cerda, CEO of online energy attribute certificate (EAC) and PPA trading platform Renewabl, told pv magazine the reason might be proposed changes to the Greenhouse Gas Protocol. Cerda argued the pending update to scope 2 guidance, which governs how companies account for the renewable electricity they consume, has introduced enough uncertainty to put a dent in corporate PPA activity. Proposed changes to the GHG Protocol include taking a more granular approach to carbon accounting, potentially placing new hourly matching obligations onto corporates. “Corporates are kind of waiting on the final decision on the protocol to see what kind of rules are going to be imposed on them,” he said. How clean energy claims are made has proven controversial in recent years. The standard approach sees companies make clean power claims by matching their consumption with renewable energy generation certificates on an annual basis. This has come under fire for painting an unrealistic picture of how much energy from renewable sources was actually used. Despite criticism, annual matching PPAs have played a significant role supporting renewables deployment. For the better part of a decade, the dominant PPA model has been to sign long-term PPAs that helped bring new projects to market. A large energy buyer, such as a multinational technology company, might commit to a 15-year deal that offered the revenue certainty that could make a new wind or solar project financially viable. Now that the proportion of solar and wind plants in the energy generation mix has changed in mature markets, the case for generous carbon accounting to support deployment has arguably weakened. At the same time, companies are wary of being accused of greenwashing. “Companies are less interested in additionality and more wary about regulation making sure that they’re not greenwashing,” Cerda explained. Compliance with regulations and financial hedging are gaining ground over additionality as demand drivers in the PPA market, according to the Renewabl CEO. Hourly matching Temporal matching is the question at the heart of the GHG protocol revision. Most corporates meet scope 2 obligations by purchasing energy attribute certificates – instruments like RECs and GOs, or via PPAs – on an annual basis. A proposed shift toward hourly matching would force companies to demonstrate that their consumption at any given hour of the day is covered by generation certificates from that same hour. It would mean businesses running heavy loads at night could no longer cover their activities with certificates from solar plants generating at noon. A granular approach to energy certificates would more accurately show the reality of clean energy consumption, however the infrastructure to support hourly matching is still catching up, according to Cerda. “[Some] issuing bodies don’t produce hourly certificates yet,” he said. “It’s really hard to know which hour to buy.” Beyond the certification gap, there are higher prices to consider. Companies that need coverage for evenings and early mornings may be competing for certificates during hours with the least renewable generation, and therefore a higher premium. Getting to 100% hourly matching currently carries a higher cost than the current annual matching regime. However, Cerda sees things changing. The Renewabl CEO suggested the higher cost is partly down to market immaturity and does not need to be an inherent feature of time-matched carbon accounting. As the certificate infrastructure develops, he argued, and demand signals improve then prices should normalize. “The focus and the point of hourly matching is not to make things more expensive,” Cerda said. “It’s basically making things more fair in the long run.” Rather than leaping from an annual matching system to one that demands round-the-clock hourly matching, Cerda suggested corporates should take a staged approach to compliance. Instead of targeting 100% hourly matching from day one, companies might seek to establish a baseline score that they can work to improve – “70% being the new 100%,” Cerda said. What comes next? Offtakers aren’t the only ones affected by potential GHG Protocol changes. Solar developers in particular could face a more challenging environment. Cerda argued that the PPA market is already oversupplied with solar-shaped generation in several European countries. Negative pricing events have become routine in Germany, Spain and increasingly elsewhere as a result. “At the moment, there’s no point building more solar because there’s excess solar,” he said. Hourly matching could serve as a better demand signal for developers, according to Cerda. If corporates need to show hourly coverage and their consumption doesn’t peak during daylight hours, then they will need to procure wind, energy storage and hybrid solutions rather than simply purchasing more solar certificates. The idea is that this will shift investment toward what the grid actually needs – for example, solar plants with co-located energy storage becoming standard. Immediate competition is also ramping up, Cerda revealed. Large generators – particularly offshore wind operators – are beginning to sell shaped certificates that mimic the output profile of other technologies. Cerda said that a wind farm with excess generation can, at the moment, sell solar-shaped certificates to meet buyer demand. This introduces major competition for solar developers in wind-rich markets such as the United Kingdom. Ultimately, energy storage will be the driver of change according to Cerda. Co-located solar-plus-storage offers flexibility – the ability to shift generation into the hours that corporate buyers actually need. Batteries also create a new certificate trading opportunity: a storage operator can absorb surplus certificates in oversupplied hours and effectively resell coverage in deficit hours, effectively acting as a temporal liquidity provider in the certificate market. “Battery storage is a key element for this hourly transition,” Cerda said. Decision time The near-term outlook for solar PPA will depend on when and how the GHG Protocol publishes its revised guidance, according to Cerda. The Renewabl CEO expects the market to rebound once uncertainty clears. “Any time there’s new legislation or new anything, there’s always a panic for a few months and then people realize it’s there’s nothing to panic about and then markets go back to normal,” said Cerda. Phased implementation might be the best outcome for solar. Cerda argued implementation could start with the larger offtakers with deeper pockets leading the charge – the hyperscalers and big tech companies already account for around half of all corporate PPA volume. This would give the certification infrastructure and broader market more time to develop. Uncertainty may remain, but the direction of travel seems clear. Buyers want better-matched energy, storage is increasingly essential rather than optional, and standalone annual-matched solar PPAs are a harder sell than they were. When the new GHG Protocol rules finally land, Cerda expects the markets will not wait long to act. The post GHG Protocol uncertainty is cooling solar corporate PPA market, says Renewabl CEO appeared first on pv magazine Global .