ESOS Phase 2 - stay ahead of the deadline

The compliance date for ESOS Phase 2 is fast approaching. Make sure you’re on track to meet the 5 December 2019 deadline.

With under a year to ensure your compliance with ESOS Phase 2, it’s critical to make sure you’re ready to complete all compliance activity within the next 12 months.

The qualification date is 31 December 2018. This means that if you know your business will fit the ESOS criteria, you can start some compliance activities now.

ESOS applies to large organisations, classified as those with:

• More than 250 employees or;
• A turnover of more than €50,000,000 and an annual balance sheet total of more than €43,000,000 or;
• Part of a corporate group containing a large enterprise.

ESOS compliance can help you get a head start with upcoming Streamlined Energy and Carbon Reporting (SECR) compliance – find out more here.

Three reasons to comply with ESOS Phase 2

1 – avoid paying over the odds

Many organisations delayed the start of their compliance journey until close to the Phase 1 deadline. This led to a squeeze in service provision, leading many suppliers to increase the cost of their services. Environment Agency (EA) data shows a significant spike in compliance notifications around one month prior to the 5 December 2015 deadline. What’s more, 33% of all who complied by July 2016, did so in the final week of Phase 1. A further 30% of notifications were logged by the end of January 2016.

Had demand for ESOS compliance support been smoothed over the course of 2015, costs may have been more reasonable as the deadline approached.

The lesson here is not to wait until the final months of 2019 to get started with Phase 2.

2 – ESOS Lead Assessor numbers are limited

There were almost 950 ESOS Lead Assessors accredited across 14 approved registers by the Phase 1 deadline. BEIS suggests there were enough Lead Assessors to help organisations reach compliance. By 5 December 2015 there were 7.3 qualifying undertakings per Lead Assessor. This is based on an estimated 6,933 organisations that met the ESOS qualification criteria.

However, this doesn’t take into account the Lead Assessors that become accredited purely to certify their own organisations alone. So, in fact, the 900+ Lead Assessors would’ve been spread far more thinly. There’s also a broad scope of the size of organisations (by employee size) and number of sites per qualifying business, meaning not every organisation would have been as easy, or as quick, to assess as another.

Our advice would be to seek guidance from compliance partners you already know who have a proven track record with Phase 1 compliance.

3 – Acting now enables you to seize your energy saving opportunity

Delaying compliance for as long as possible means by the time you comply you’ll simply be ticking a box and more than likely paying an unreasonably high cost.

Acting now allows your organisation to really invest in the compliance process by ensuring you have strong and accurate reporting of your energy consumption data. Accurate data is the start of being able to visualise and truly understand when, where, and how you use energy and, more importantly, how you can improve your efficiency to increase savings. EIC can assist you with implementing any energy saving measures identified as part of your ESOS recommendations report. We’ll also ensure these measures work in harmony with each other as part of a bespoke, joined-up Strategic Energy Solution.

Why make EIC your trusted compliance partner?

Whether it’s ESOS, SECR, or CCAs, EIC will work with you to reach compliance deadlines and targets. In Phase 1 of ESOS our team identified 2,829 individual energy efficiency opportunities, equivalent to 461GWh or £43.9m of annual savings across 1,148 individual audits. We also helped over 300 ESOS Phase 1 clients avoid combined penalties of over £48m, based on maximum fines.

With under a year until the ESOS Phase 2 deadline, we’re urging you to make a start with compliance. To find out more about how we can help you comply, call us on 01527 511 757 or email esos@eic.co.uk