(August 18, 2026)

By Margret Nellissery, Senior Analyst and Jean Todea, Senior Communications Lead

Last week, we shared the headline results from the GHG Protocol's Scope 2 consultation, including the near-universal support for a legacy clause to protect existing PPAs and word that the next public consultation isn't expected until Q2 2027. This week, we’re digging into one of the two proposals we know matters most to you: hourly matching.

Hourly matching is one of the most significant changes on the table. Instead of relying primarily on annual matching, it would require aligning your electricity consumption with renewable energy generation hour by hour. Seventy per cent of respondents expressed no or low support for making that switch, and support was limited across nearly every region and stakeholder group, except for Western Asia and Northern Africa.

Low support doesn't mean outright disagreement. Most respondents recognized the value of aligning contracts more closely to when electricity is consumed and generated. Done well, hourly matching could reduce the risk of overstating emissions reductions, improve transparency and create stronger market signals for energy storage, demand response and flexible load management. Many also saw it as encouraging procurement for the hours when clean electricity has the greatest impact on emissions.

The real concern is feasibility. Overly stringent hourly requirements could unintentionally slow renewable energy procurement, particularly in markets where hourly consumption data, storage options or supporting infrastructure remain limited. Stakeholders pointed to accessing hourly data, market readiness, administrative complexity and cost as the strongest themes in their responses. Our own analysis found that hourly matching could nearly double the cost of power purchase agreements, an increase of 98 to 139 per cent depending on the sector, so this isn't a small ask for buyers.

Respondents proposed ways to ease the transition: regional exemptions for markets that aren't ready and standardized load profiles to estimate hourly consumption when real data isn't yet available. Our analysis also found that the current annual matching approach already results in 40 percent of hours being matched, and that matching additional hours becomes increasingly expensive. Setting interim targets between 40 and 100 percent would signal change without stalling momentum.

The throughline is broad support for improving temporal accuracy, paired with a clear expectation that implementation should be phased, flexible and responsive to differences in market maturity, which is exactly what we've been advocating for on your behalf.

Next week, we'll look at the second major proposal: deliverability.