Join us on 16 May to hear from David Pierpoint from the Retrofit Academy. He will speak about How to engage a retrofit coordinator and how does it increase an NIA Member’s opportunity? You will find out more about what the Retrofit Academy does, what their aims and objectives are, how you as NIA Members can get involved, and why they are play an important role in our path to net zero. We look forward to seeing you there!
New energy efficiency funding awarded
Last month, the Government awarded £1.8 billion of funding to boost energy efficiency and cut emissions in homes and public buildings across England. The funding is being delivered through the next phases of the Home Upgrade Grant, Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund and Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme and will cover the financial years 2023-24 and 2024-25. Combined, the schemes will upgrade over 115,000 homes across England and support around 20,000 jobs in the construction and retrofit sectors.
Home Upgrade Grant Phase 2
- £630m of funding delivered via local authorities.
- Will deliver energy efficiency upgrades to over 25,000 private households.
- Eligible households must be:
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- Low-income
- Off the gas grid
- EPC D-G
- Expected to support 7,000 jobs.
- For a list of successful applicants, click here.
Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund Wave 2:1
- £778m of government funding, in addition to £1.1bn in match funding provided by local authorities and housing associations.
- For local authorities, social housing providers and charities to upgrade their housing stock.
- 90,000 homes are expected to be upgraded under the scheme.
- Properties must have an EPC of D to G to be eligible for improvements.
- Expected to support 13,000 jobs.
- For a list of successful applicants, click here.
Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme Phase 3b
- £409m of funding
- 144 public sector organisations have been awarded funding to decarbonise public sector buildings, such as schools and hospitals.
- The scheme supports the Government’s commitment to reduce emissions from public sector buildings by 75% from 2035 (compared to 2017 levels).
- This is expected to save the public sector an estimated £650m per year to 2037.
- For a list of successful applicants, click here.
We are delighted to attend the SHDF and HUG Retrofit Ready launch event being organised by DESNZ today (27 April). We will be at the networking breakfast (9.45-10.45) to meet successful Grant Recipients and facilitate connections with NIA member organisations. We hope to see some of you there!
We know that many of you have been instrumental to the delivery of previous phases of these schemes. Good luck to those of you that will also be involved in the upcoming phases. Keep up the good work!
Great British Insulation Scheme – Government responds
The Government has released their response to the ECO+ consultation, which has been renamed as the Great British Insulation Scheme to help with consumer awareness. The Government received 176 responses to the consultation, which were generally supportive of the proposals. The plans for the scheme’s design remain broadly the same as set out in the initial consultation. You can read NIA’s response here.
The £1 billion energy efficiency programme runs from April 2023 until March 2026 and aims to improve 300,000 of the country’s least efficient homes (council tax bands A-D in England, and A-E in Scotland and Wales), saving households on average around £300-400 a year on energy bills. The government’s strategic aims for the scheme are to help tackle fuel poverty, achieve Net Zero, and reduce total UK energy demand by 15% from 2021 levels by 2030.
The main significant change from the initial consultation proposals is that all measures delivered under the Scheme will be installed in accordance with PAS 2035/2030. This was something we argued for in our response, so we are delighted that the Government has taken our comments on board. PAS has played a critical role in raising the standard of installations and customer service across the industry. Therefore, it is important to see all ECO+ measures being delivered to PAS rather than reduced standards.
Suppliers may begin delivering measures ahead of the legislation coming into force, and Government will take steps to facilitate this. Scheme targets will be confirmed when the Final Impact Assessment is published but the Government response indicates that the first-year target will be no higher than £8,850,000 in notional Annual Bill Savings (ABS).
You can find a helpful summary of the proposed scheme here. We will shortly be posting our own summary of the Government’s response on our website.
Thank you to our members for their crucial inputs to our consultation response. This is a great example of how we can work together to shape policy in the sector. Now we look forward to industry delivering the scheme successfully! If you encounter any challenges, please contact info@nia-uk.org and we can see if we can raise it.
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NIA members are vital to help shape our consultation responses. If you would like to receive draft consultations for you to provide your input, please email info@NIA-uk.org