Carbon Reduction Plan — PPN 006 compliant, done for you

What a Carbon Reduction Plan is

A Carbon Reduction Plan (CRP) is a published document that UK government suppliers must produce to bid for major public contracts. It sets out your organisation's carbon footprint and your commitment to reach Net Zero by 2050.

The requirement comes from PPN 006 — the Procurement Policy Note formerly known as PPN 06/21, renamed in February 2025 to align with the Procurement Act 2023. The requirements themselves did not change with the renaming: if a bid asked for a PPN 06/21 CRP before, PPN 006 asks for the same thing now.

Who needs one

You need a compliant CRP if you bid for central government contracts with an estimated value above £5 million per year (including VAT) — covering goods, services and works procured by in-scope organisations such as central government departments, executive agencies and non-departmental public bodies.

In practice the requirement spreads further: many framework operators, local authorities and prime contractors now ask their suppliers for a CRP regardless of contract size, because it is the recognised UK standard. Failing the CRP check is a condition of participation — without one, your bid does not proceed.

What a compliant CRP must contain

The published technical standard is specific. Your CRP must:

• Commit to Net Zero by 2050 for your UK operations, stated explicitly.
• Report your current emissions for scope 1 (fuel combustion, company vehicles, refrigerants) and scope 2 (purchased electricity) — the same boundary as a SECR disclosure.
• Report five scope 3 categories: upstream transportation and distribution, waste generated in operations, business travel, employee commuting, and downstream transportation and distribution.
• Include a baseline year and year-on-year comparison, in tonnes of CO₂e, calculated with recognised methods and the current DEFRA conversion factors.
• Describe your carbon reduction projects — completed, current and planned measures, and the emissions reduction you project.
• Be board approved, published on your website, and updated at least annually, following the published template.

Common failure points: missing scope 3 categories, no named baseline year, an unsigned or unpublished plan, or a plan that names the old PPN but hasn't been updated in a year. Reviewers check.

Done for you, by a specialist

Writing a first CRP means assembling a carbon footprint to a public, auditable standard — usually under bid-deadline pressure. We match you with a vetted carbon specialist who:

1. Scopes your footprint — gathers your energy, fleet, travel, commuting and waste data, and fills the gaps with recognised estimation methods where primary data doesn't exist yet.
2. Calculates your baseline and current emissions using the current DEFRA conversion factors, across scope 1, 2 and the five required scope 3 categories.
3. Drafts the CRP to the PPN 006 template — including your reduction projects and Net Zero commitment — ready for board sign-off and publication.
4. Sets up the annual update so next year's refresh is a data drop, not a rebuild.

If you already report under SECR, most of the data is collected once and reused — one footprint, two obligations.

CRP, SECR and ESOS — one data set, three obligations

The same energy and emissions data underpins all three UK regimes. A CRP adds the five scope 3 categories and the Net Zero commitment on top of a SECR-style scope 1 and 2 footprint, while an ESOS assessment audits the energy behind it. A specialist who works across all three collects the data once and keeps the figures consistent — inconsistent numbers across published documents are a red flag for reviewers.

Get your bid unblocked: tell us about your company below and a vetted specialist will confirm exactly what your CRP needs and quote a fixed fee — free, no obligation.