# Which grid emission factor does a CCTS obligated plant use for purchased electricity?

Canonical: https://senseible.earth/answers/ccts-grid-emission-factor-frozen-baseline

The latest CEA average grid factor applied in the baseline year, kept fixed for every compliance year, so a plant gets no benefit from the grid getting cleaner. With a dedicated power purchase deal it uses the supplier's verified factor, or 1.19 t CO2 per MWh as default.

## Purchased electricity in BEE's compliance procedure

- Use the latest average grid emission factor from CEA's CO2 Baseline Database for the Indian power sector.
- The factor applied in the baseline year applies across the compliance years. There is no normalisation for power mix, so credit comes only from the plant's own actions.
- With a dedicated power purchase agreement, use the supplier-specific factor with documents verified by an accredited agency. If none is available, use the default of 1.19 t CO2 per MWh published by CEA.
- Purchased or exported heat uses the emission factor of the steam generation fuel mix, in g CO2 per kcal.

## Why it matters

Cutting grid electricity, or moving to verified renewable supply, still lowers reported intensity. A newer, lower CEA factor does not.

## What Senseible does here

Senseible keeps a plant's fuel and electricity invoices as dated, fingerprinted monthly records, the activity data its monitoring plan and verifier work from.

- [India grid factor 2025-26](https://senseible.earth/answers/india-grid-emission-factor-2025-26)
- [Which CEA grid factor for which year](https://senseible.earth/answers/which-cea-grid-factor-version-for-which-year)
- [BM-T-003 electricity emission factor](https://senseible.earth/answers/ccts-tool-bm-t-003-electricity-emission-factor)

Sources: [BEE, Detailed Procedure for Compliance Mechanism under CCTS](https://beeindia.gov.in/WriteReadData/RTF1984/RTF-PDF-d9cc8e301df47417_1776057016.pdf)

Last reviewed 2026-10-23. Section 5.7 (vi) to (viii) of the scanned compliance procedure, read on 23 October 2026.