Singapore Tightens SS 673: RECs Must Link to Power Fed Into Its Grid

Singapore has tightened the rules that govern which renewable energy certificates can back corporate clean-power claims, requiring that Scope 2 REC-based claims be tied to renewable electricity supplied directly to the Singapore power grid.

Minister of State for Energy, Trade and Industry Gan Siow Huang announced the release of the updated Singapore Standard 673 (SS 673) at the Asia Clean Energy Summit. The revision targets the integrity of sustainability reporting built on RECs — instruments that represent the environmental and non-power attributes of 1 MWh of renewable energy delivered to an electricity grid, and that companies use for their Scope 2, or purchased-energy, emissions claims.

Announcing the update, Gan said the revised standard "will strengthen trust in corporate sustainability reporting and reduce the risk and issues of greenwashing concerns that we have heard."

What does the revision change?

The update specifies the types of RECs that can support claims of renewable electricity consumption in Singapore. Under the revised standard:

• Companies claiming renewable electricity usage must use RECs linked to renewable electricity supplied directly to Singapore's power grid.
• Qualifying RECs include those from renewable electricity generated in Singapore.
• They also include RECs from approved low-carbon electricity import projects contractually supplied via a physical interconnection to the Singapore power grid.
• RECs from renewable energy projects that do not supply electricity into Singapore may no longer be used to make market-based Scope 2 claims.

That last clause carries the commercial weight. Corporates in Singapore have previously been able to buy unbundled certificates from projects elsewhere in the region, a practice critics link to inflated or misleading clean-power claims. The revision cuts that channel off for market-based Scope 2 reporting.

Why the standard exists, and why it moved

Singapore launched SS 673 in 2021 as a framework to improve the integrity of measurement, reporting and verification (MRV) requirements for the issuance and management of RECs. It sets out good practices for REC transactions and claims.

Four years on, the government has now narrowed what those claims can rest on. According to Gan, the update aligns the standard with international practice and responds to businesses' requests for greater clarity on what RECs represent and the claims they can support.

The minister also drew a direct line between claim integrity and the economics of Singapore's electricity import programme.

"Businesses will have greater confidence in the renewable electricity claims that they make, and also may be willing to pay more for imported electricity with credible RECs," Gan said. "This, we think, could in turn improve the commercial viability of import projects."

What does this change for import projects and buyers?

For import developers, the revision functions as a demand-side subsidy paid in credibility rather than cash. If corporates pay a premium for imported electricity bundled with RECs that survive scrutiny under SS 673, approved low-carbon import projects — those delivering power through physical interconnections to the Singapore grid — gain a stronger revenue case.

For corporate buyers, the calculus runs the other way in the short term. Companies that relied on certificates from projects with no physical link to Singapore's grid will need to re-source their REC portfolios, shifting toward domestic renewable generation or approved imports.

For auditors and reporting teams, the standard supplies a sharper test: a market-based Scope 2 claim in Singapore now requires a demonstrable contractual and physical connection between the certified megawatt-hour and the grid the claimant actually draws from.

The milestone to track now is adoption. The revised SS 673 enters a reporting ecosystem where Scope 2 claims increasingly face regulatory and market challenge, and Singapore's move — anchoring certificates to the grid they serve — signals how far Asian jurisdictions may go in policing the gap between purchased attributes and physical supply.