The CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme is aimed at reducing energy usage from large private and public sector organisations. The Government backed scheme covers the UK, funded by DEFRA, and is administered by the Environment Agency. The project saw the formalisation of a strategic partnership between secure managed hosting specialist eLINIA and software and application development provider SciSys. SciSys, who are based in Chippenham specialise in system integrations, provide expert technical consultancy and support in house applications for organisations across the UK.
Since 1999 SciSys has supplied support services to the Environment Agency for both application developed by SciSys and third parties. SciSys has conducted numerous system enhancements and upgrades. SciSys run a fully integrated service desk that provides immediate response for critical issues.
The Need
Starting in April 2010, the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme is the UK’s first mandatory carbon trading scheme. The aim of the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme is to reduce the level of carbon emissions currently produced by the larger ‘low energy intensive’ organisations by approximately 1.2 million tonnes of CO2 per year by 2020.
SciSys needed a highly secure hosting partner that had a strong reputation and that could handle a project of this size and scale. Having been introduced to eLINIA and following preliminary meetings between the two companies and agreement was reached and the project commenced.
Heather Dinham, Environment Division Director at SciSys, commented, “The Environment Agency is one of our biggest customers, so it was essential to partner with a reliable and experienced hosting company. The infrastructure for the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme website will be hosted in eLINIA’s carbon neutral data centre in Slough. This means that the IT is in keeping with the Environment Agency’s overarching goal to reduce carbon emissions.”
The Solution
SciSys developed bespoke software for the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme website, constructing a unique registration and administrative tool for organisations to deliver annual carbon footprint reports. The CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme covers both public and private sector. The carbon reduction scheme is expected to affect approximately 5,000 organisations in the UK. In doing so, it is anticipated that the scheme will affect 25% of total business sector emissions within the UK.
The CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme itself will also use software developed by SciSys to regulate and administrate the information contained within the website to run audits, produce reports and organisation league tables of carbon emission.
Why eLINIA
eLINIA were seen as a perfect fit and solution partner for the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme project as experienced hosting specialists who have worked with some of the most security conscious organisations in the world, including government bodies and banks. eLINIA provide highly secure managed hosting services ensuring that the website is available 24/7/365. The eLINIA CRC solution also includes disaster recovery, realtime data replication and backup. Coupled with this, eLINIA provides the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme with “green” hosting, using fuel from renewable sources in one of its tier 3 data centres, making eLINIA the obvious choice for a project of this scale and nature.
John Jones, CEO, eLINIA, commented: “The CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme website will process a significant amount of information, so naturally uptime and security are critical to its success. Like SciSys, we have significant experience of major government projects so our partnership on the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme was an easy fit. The project had tight legislative timescales and we delivered within 11 months of contract award”
Key Benefits
- Bespoke applications and software
- Highly secure and robust platform
- "Green" hosting environment
- Disaster recovery