Analysis by Andreas Gunst: Removal of the United Kingdom Climate Change Levy Exemption
The United Kingdom´s Climate Change Levy (CCL) was introduced in 2001 under the Finance Act 2000 with the aim of taxing the energy usage of non-domestic consumers with the exception of the transportation sector. An exemption system was introduced to allow consumers of renewable source energy to avoid paying the CCL, by means of the levy exemption certificate (LEC) system.
Operators of United Kingdom resident installations and foreign installations could obtain accreditation for the scheme and receive LECs. These would ultimately be sold together with the underlying renewable source electricity to suppliers in the United Kingdom who would claim exemption on behalf of their consumers. LECs would be sold with other evidentiary instruments such as guarantees of origin and generator declaration for the purpose of fuel mix disclosure (FMD), feed-in tariff levelisation benefits, related determination of green excluded electricity under the contracts for difference (CfD) scheme and as evidence on 'green tariff' products. The appertaining commercial benefit was usually priced into the LEC price.
In the United Kingdom´s 2015 Budget, announced on 8 July 2015, Chancellor George Osborne claimed that as the United Kingdom has established a long-term framework for investment in renewable energy, the CCL exemption scheme, and therefore the LEC scheme, shall be removed. It is from the announcement not fully clear whether the exemption will be removed for both national and foreign installations, or just the latter. The explanation for the change appeared to be mainly concerned with foreign installations.
This note will briefly outline consequences of the removal of the CCL exemption regime on relevant agreements, notably:
§ agreements for the delivery of LECs and guarantees of origin/generator declarations;
§ agreements for the delivery of renewable source electricity into the British electricity market; and
§ agreement for the purchase of interconnection capacity and transmission services on interconnectors into the British electricity market.