What’s on Offer?
Its easy to think there are not any scheme/grants available to upgrade our homes to improve their energy efficiency. However, a quick look through the Ofgem website hights a few. These are mainly for those on benefits, quite rightly so, but may also help other people too.
The Boiler Upgrade Scheme (BUS) supports the decarbonisation of heat in buildings. It provides upfront capital grants to support the installation of heat pumps and biomass boilers in homes and non-domestic buildings in England and Wales.
Acting on behalf of property owners, installers can apply for:
£7,500 off the cost and installation of an air source heat pump
£7,500 off the cost and installation of a ground source heat pump, including water source heat pumps
£5,000 off the cost and installation of a biomass boiler
£450 million of grant funding is available over three years from 2022 to 2025.
This one is obviously for those who have the up front money to install a heat pump and have already carried out other energy efficiency improvements, but its still a decent amount of money off the initial cost.
The Energy Company Obligation (ECO) is a government energy efficiency scheme in Great Britain designed to tackle fuel poverty and help reduce carbon emissions.
The ECO4 scheme supports energy efficiency measures in the home of those considered to be in fuel poverty.
In order to benefit from ECO your property will need to require energy efficiency upgrades. The specific measures that would benefit your home would be determined by a retrofit assessment. You must own your own home or have permission from your landlord, including if the property is owned by a social housing provider or management company.
You can contact any of the obligated energy suppliers to find out how they may be able to help you benefit from the ECO scheme, even if they are not your energy provider.
Who is eligible?
You could be eligible for ECO if you receive at least one of the following benefits:
Child Benefit
Pension Guarantee Credit
Income-related Employment and Support Allowance (ESA)
Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA)
Income Support
Tax Credits (Child Tax Credits and Working Tax Credits)
Universal Credit
Housing benefit
Pension credit saving credit
The Warm Home Discount (WHD) scheme supports those on low-income and who are vulnerable to cold-related illness or living wholly or mainly in fuel poverty and came into effect in April 2011. The government has extended the scheme through to March 2026. The scheme requires domestic energy suppliers with over 1000 customers to provide an annual discount to customer bills.
Some smaller suppliers that are not obligated under WHD also voluntarily participate in part of the scheme.
You can find the list of participating energy suppliers in the Eligibility section on the Ofgem website, a link is provide at the end of this blog.
The Great British Insulation Scheme is a new government energy efficiency scheme (formerly known as ECO+) that will be administered by Ofgem. It is designed to deliver improvements to the least energy-efficient homes in Great Britain to tackle fuel poverty and help reduce energy bills.
The scheme complements the Energy Company Obligation (ECO4) scheme, yet unlike ECO4’s ‘whole house’ approach, this scheme will mostly deliver single insulation measures.
As well as supporting low-income and vulnerable households, it will also be available to those living in homes with an Energy Performance Certificate rating of D-G, and within Council Tax bands A-D in England and A-E in Scotland and Wales. Use the following link to see if you are eligible.
https://www.gov.uk/apply-great-british-insulation-scheme
The scheme will work by placing an obligation on medium and large energy companies to deliver measures that result in reduced energy usage. It is intended to run from around April 2023 until March 2026.
For details on all schemes go here: https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/environmental-and-social-schemes
So, there is some money available out there, why not see if you can take advantage of it and improve the energy efficiency of your home and reduce your energy bills?
