New paper · August 2026
Getting Scope 2 Right: A Path to Improve Accuracy, Preserve Participation, and Accelerate Decarbonization
The Greenhouse Gas Protocol is revising Scope 2 for the first time in over a decade. The proposed hourly time-matching and granular deliverability requirements are aimed at a real credibility problem, but as written they would raise the cost and complexity of long-term procurement, the instrument that has driven most new project deployment for over a decade.
This paper proposes two changes to the foundations of Scope 2 reporting, plus six tangible actions to enable them: retire the inaccurate "usage" claim in favor of claims about financing and attribute retirement, and differentiate procurement instruments by the function they perform, with a bright-line test separating long-term procurement from spot-market certificate purchases.
About the author
John Powers has spent 23 years in renewable energy. He joined Renewable Choice Energy in Boulder, Colorado in 2003 and helped lead the firm through its acquisition by Schneider Electric, where he served as Vice President of Global Renewable Energy and Carbon Advisory.
He led the team that has advised on roughly 10 percent of all corporate power purchase agreements ever signed, some 25 gigawatts. His team also advised on over $2.5B in tax credit investments, leading global supply chain decarbonization programs such as Energize and Catalyze, energy attribute certificates, carbon offsets, and on-site projects in markets across North and South America, Europe, India, Japan, Singapore, Vietnam, Australia, and Mexico.
He is currently an independent voice on electricity markets, compute-driven load growth, and greenhouse gas accounting. He holds a degree in mechanical engineering from Duke University and lives in Colorado.