If a breach of contract causes or contributes to the customer to miss its GHG targets, this has negative climate impacts and may be hard to quantify and evidence the loss caused to the injured party in missing in their GHG targets. So, in effect, there may be no remedy available to the customer.
Additionally, most contractual remedies (other than those triggering termination and suspension rights) are pecuniary in nature – there is no standard practice of alternative remedies or consideration given to options which are not designed to improve the financial position of the injured party.
The Chancery Lane Project, a collaborative effort of UK lawyers to develop new contracts and model laws to help fight climate change, has published a model clause including climate considerations and metrics for performance in standard contract drafting; and providing a mechanism akin to liquidated damages for breaches with negative climate impacts, in the form of a mandatory donation to appropriate non-profit organisation. This provides an alternative to pure cash compensation.
The model clause is available in the attached volume at page 24 (“Jessica’s Clause”).