The Carbon Credit Trading Scheme (CCTS), administered by the Bureau of Energy Efficiency, sets facility-level greenhouse gas intensity targets across seven energy-intensive sectors, aluminium, cement, chlor-alkali, pulp and paper, petroleum refining, petrochemicals, and textiles, replacing the earlier Perform, Achieve and Trade programme with a system where over-performing entities earn tradeable Carbon Credit Certificates (CCCs) and under-performing ones must buy them. Entities register and their certificates are issued, transferred, and surrendered through the ICM Registry, managed by Grid-India, while the CERC (Terms and Conditions for Purchase and Sale of Carbon Credit Certificates) Regulations, 2026 govern how those certificates are actually bought and sold on power exchanges. We advise on CCTS registration, target compliance, MRV (monitoring, reporting, verification) obligations, and participation in the parallel voluntary offset mechanism for non-covered entities.

The compliance calendar itself is unusually compressed: the first monitoring period began in mid-2026, the first verified emissions reports are due by 31 July 2026, and the first CCCs are expected to be issued before year-end, with secondary market trading opening the year after. Entities that miss registration now risk missing their first compliance cycle entirely rather than simply falling behind on paperwork, and with the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism now linking a verifiable domestic carbon price to reduced CBAM liability on exports, the cost of late CCTS readiness extends beyond the domestic penalty into competitiveness abroad. 

We help clients build compliance into their operating calendar now, rather than reacting once the registry and reporting deadlines have already passed