Corporate Power Purchase Agreements (CPPAs)
For Irish off-takers looking to leverage the democratised access to renewable energy, Captured Carbon provides the expertise to structure and negotiate your Corporate Power Purchase Agreement with bespoke frameworks. We help corporate buyers source 100% green electricity, aligning long-term commercial certainty with genuine sustainability outcomes.
Securing The Right Energy Strategy Critical To Credible Green Solutions
A Corporate Power Purchase Agreement (CPPA) is a long-term contract spanning up to 15 years. The agreement allows corporate buyers to directly access renewable electricity from wind or solar energy generators at a fixed price, so they don’t have to face wholesale market volatility.
While once exclusive to hyperscale data centres and large multinationals like Google and Microsoft, the emergence of multi-buyer and sleeved structures has enabled a broad scale of small-to-mid-sized commercial and industrial (C&I) customers to access green PPAs. These structures overcome the traditional barriers of scale and creditworthiness that once limited green PPAs to massive tech giants and multinationals. The CPPA now works as the critical tool for offtakers to meet the Corporate Net-Zero Standard.
In parallel with the opportunities, signing a CPPA is also associated with certain risks and challenges. Corporate buyers must have the right strategy and a constructive long-term goal in place to defend their operating margins while complying with stringent Scope 2 reporting mandates. Captured Carbon acts as the expert intermediary within the Integrated Single Electricity Market (I-SEM). We design CPPAs for financial hedges, enabling corporate buyers to lock in long-term energy costs and demonstrate true “additionality” for their ESG reporting.
Common Risks & Challenges Associated with Corporate Power Purchase Agreements in the Irish Renewable Energy Market
- Contract Structure Complexities
In the Irish market, there is no single CPPA template that fits all situations. The allocation of risk—such as who bears the cost of grid constraints, curtailment, or imbalance penalties—is often the biggest bottleneck. Captured Carbon simplifies the process by structuring bespoke documentation that satisfies the risk appetites of both corporate boards and project financiers.
- Managing Long-Term Costs & Volatility
Energy demand is surging, especially for data centres in Ireland. Relying on the Day-Ahead or intraday wholesale markets exposes these massive operations to geopolitical price shocks and price cannibalisation. Buyers need to adopt expert forecasting and strategic contract pricing to ensure predictable long-term operating costs and to protect profit margins.
- Complying with Sustainability Mandates
Stringent sustainable reporting is necessary for corporate net zero goals. This includes stringent international frameworks outlined by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), complex Scope 2 emissions reporting standards, and guidelines from the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU). There is still much to catch up on. An efficient CPPA is critical for passing these carbon audits and mitigating greenwashing risks.
- Renewable Intermittency
Corporate operations run 24/7, but the wind does not always blow, and the sun does not always shine. The integration of intermittent renewable generation into a consistent corporate load profile presents substantial technical and financial challenges. Developing contracts to address “shape risk” and maintain grid stability for 24/7 operations is critical.
Delivering Bespoke CPPAs: Turning Energy Challenges Into Opportunities
A value-driven CPPA must intelligently allocate four primary risks: Price, Volume, Profile (Shape), and Imbalance. As an active electricity trader and consultant, we negotiate pricing models that secure the developer’s debt service obligations while delivering a competitive, stable rate for the corporate buyer.
- 1. 100% Renewable Supply With a Direct Chain of Custody
Guarantee of Origins (GoOs) generated by your contracted asset are transferred directly to you, providing a clear, auditable link between the electricity you consume and the renewable generation that produced it. This is materially different from purchasing unbundled GoOs on the secondary market, where the traceability and vintage of the certificate may bear no meaningful relationship to your actual consumption.
- 2. Competitive Positioning and ESG Credibility
Demonstrating a genuine, well-structured renewable energy commitment works as a more meaningful commercial differentiator than a purchased green label. We help our enterprise customers factor sustainability selection and investment decisions to ensure a competitive positioning.
- 3. CSRD-Ready Sustainability Reporting
With market-based Scope 2 emissions reporting now a formal disclosure obligation under CSRD for a growing cohort of Irish businesses, the quality of renewable procurement evidence is under increasing scrutiny from auditors, investors, and supply chain partners. A bilateral CPPA, with specific asset GoOs, temporal matching provisions, and documented additionality, is the most defensible basis for market-based reporting available.
CPPA Structures Available to Irish Off-Takers
Fixed-Price Contracts / Offtake Agreements
We structure and underwrite bilateral PPAs directly with the buyer, providing price certainty and fixed-price terms across a range of tenors to hedge against energy market volatility.
Physical & Financial CPPAs
Captured Carbon facilitates different transactional models for physical delivery to your site and virtual/financial arrangements that act as a financial hedge without trading power directly.
Green Energy Verification
We supply Guarantees of Origin (GOs) and independent green energy verification for corporate buyers to confidently report on their sustainability and decarbonisation goals.
Energy Trading & Route to Market
How large energy users manage electricity market participation is different from corporate buyers. We tailor balancing markets and forward contracts to optimise energy procurement costs for different types of participants.
Key Considerations for Offtakers Entering the Irish CPPA Market
Industries We Support
Strike Price
With increased high wind penetration driving price cannibalisation, CPPAs must incorporate cannibalisation discounts into their strike-price methodology. Pairing intelligent Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) with their load profiles enables behind-the-meter load shifting and market arbitrage.
GoO Quality
Hourly or monthly temporal matching is emerging as the standard of proof for organisations making meaningful 24/7 carbon-free energy claims. We structure GoO provisions with this trajectory in mind, ensuring your procurement approach remains credible as reporting standards tighten beyond current CSRD baseline requirements.
Interconnection Effects
New grid interconnection projects will progressively integrate the I-SEM with wider European wholesale markets. New pricing dynamics in Irish generation will influence long-run PPA strike-price benchmarks with CPPA counterparty options for Irish off-takers considering pan-European renewable procurement strategies.
Long-Term Pricing
The current Irish CPPA market sits at an inflection point. The window of "buyer-friendly" conditions in the Irish CPPA market is unlikely to persist indefinitely. The strategic imperative is to move from passive observation to more proactive execution of internal buyer-ready processes and layered procurement strategies.
Why Choose Captured Carbon for Your Corporate PPA?
The most significant reason corporate buyers rely on us is that our involvement does not end with the execution of the contracts. We provide comprehensive support through GoO registry management, settlement monitoring and sustainability reporting alignment throughout the life of your agreement. So as market conditions and reporting frameworks evolve, we help you adapt more proactively.
- Bespoke Structuring, Not Off-The-Shelf Agreements
No two corporate buyers have identical consumption profiles, risk appetites, or sustainability reporting obligations. We design every CPPA structure from first principles — starting with your business requirements and working backwards to the right counterparty, the right contract type, and the right commercial terms. We do not fit buyers into standard templates.
- I-SEM Trading Expertise, Applied to Your Contract
As active participants in the Irish electricity market, we understand I-SEM settlement mechanics, imbalance dynamics and curtailment risk in practice. This real-market knowledge directly influences how we structure your agreement and what protections we negotiate into it.
- Access to the Right Counterparties
We maintain established relationships across the Irish renewable development community — from early-stage projects seeking anchor offtake to operational assets looking for direct corporate buyers. Our network means we can identify genuine counterparty options suited to your load profile, location, and credit requirements without a lengthy and speculative market search on your part.
- Sustainability Integrity Built Into Every Structure
Additionality credentials, GoO transfer provisions and audit-ready reporting frameworks are structural requirements from the outset. We ensure your CPPA holds up to the scrutiny of CSRD auditors, SBTi verifiers and investor ESG reviews.
Our Process of Structuring CPPAs for Irish C&I Offtakers
- 1. Off-Taker Profile and Reporting Assessment
We begin by understanding your consumption data, existing supply arrangements, sustainability targets, and disclosure obligations under CSRD or voluntary frameworks. This shapes every structural and commercial decision that follows and ensures the CPPA we design actually serves your business — commercially and reputationally.
- 2. Structure Design and Commercial Modelling
Physical or virtual? Direct bilateral or aggregated? Fixed strike or indexed? We model the key variables — price, volume tolerance, tenor, settlement mechanism, and GoO provisions — against your risk appetite and budget certainty requirements and present the trade-offs clearly before any counterparty conversations begin.
- 3. Counterparty Origination
We identify and approach the most suitable renewable generators from our network, conducting credit, operational, and planning due diligence on shortlisted parties before any commercial engagement begins. We protect your process from wasted time on counterparties who cannot deliver a bankable, operationally credible agreement.
- 4. Negotiation and Contract Execution
We lead commercial negotiation on your behalf across all key terms: strike price, pricing mechanism, volume tolerances, curtailment risk allocation, balancing responsibility, GoO transfer provisions, and termination rights. Every contract we help structure is designed to be robust, audit-ready, and bankable.
- 5. Ongoing Management and Sustainability Reporting Support
We remain engaged with the client even after executing the CPPA. Our ongoing support is available through GoO issuance and retirement, market-based Scope 2 reporting and contract performance monitoring as the I-SEM and CSRD landscape continues to evolve.
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FAQs for RESS Developers
A: The 10 GWh threshold you may have encountered reflects the legacy minimum for direct bilateral CPPAs, where a single corporate buyer contracts alone with a generator. That threshold has become far less relevant as the market has evolved. Aggregated and multi-buyer structures now allow C&I buyers with significantly lower individual consumption to participate in CPPAs by pooling demand alongside other offtakers against a shared renewable asset. The economics, GoO transfer, and price certainty benefits are structurally equivalent. If your business has credible ESG commitments and wants access to genuinely traceable renewable electricity, volume is no longer the obstacle it once was. The conversation is worth having.
A: In most cases, no. In a Virtual CPPA, your existing supply arrangement remains entirely in place as the CPPA operates as a purely financial overlay. In a sleeved Physical CPPA, the utility remains involved as the balancing and delivery intermediary, so again, your supply relationship is not severed. Where a CPPA does require transitioning your supply is in less common direct wire or direct corporate access structures; even then, the transition is managed as part of the contract execution process.
A: Additionality is the principle that your renewable energy procurement should be causally linked to the construction of new renewable capacity that would not otherwise have been built. This means your CPPA is contracted against a project that needs your offtake commitment to secure project finance and reach construction. Your auditors will increasingly care about this, and so will SBTi verifiers, RE100 reporting administrators, and supply chain sustainability reviewers operating under CSRD disclosure obligations
A: Yes, you can. For many C&I buyers, a partial hedge is actually the more commercially sensible starting point. A CPPA does not need to cover your entire load. You can even contract against 50% or 60% of your annual consumption and lock in a fixed price and renewable credentials.
This way, you can have a defined portion of your energy while retaining flexibility on the remainder through your utility supply contract.
A: The obligations depend on the specific structure of the contract and the accounting standards that your organisation applies. Under IFRS 9 (Financial Instruments), virtual PPAs are treated as a Contract for Difference (CFD) and are marked to market on the balance sheet with fair value movements recorded in profit or loss. Physical CPPAs that meet the "own use" exemption under IFRS 9 are able to be accounted for as an executory contract. The accounting implications of a CPPA and the choice of contract type can have a significant impact on how the agreement is ultimately presented in your financial statements.