The government has been urged to push back its 2026 ban on fossil fuel boilers for off-gas grid homes by four years, partly due to concerns that the electricity network will not be ready to cope with increased heat pump installations.
A new report, published by the local government think tank Localis, said the government’s proposed deadline for stopping the installation of fossil fuel heating systems in off-grid homes should be brought into line with the 2030 cut-off date for properties connected to the gas network.
“The current all-or-nothing approach of the government, through the 2026 end date for the installation of fossil fuel heating as well as the ‘heat pump first’ approach, places an unfair and disproportionate burden on off-grid properties,” it stated.
The report warned that networks in many rural areas are not prepared for a widespread switch to electricity as a primary heating source. It said the proposed ‘heat pump first’ approach means that reinforcement of rural electricity infrastructure must be a “key” government priority.
Rather than focusing on “costly major transformations” to heating systems, “more achievable improvements to efficiency risk being overlooked”, the report added. It urged the government to provide funding for “fabric first” improvements to rural homes via local councils.
It noted that the Heat and Buildings Strategy, published last year, was “largely silent” on such energy efficiency improvements.
And while the strategy contains a “baked in assumption” that the price of heat pumps will drastically reduce by 2030, Localis said four years is not enough time for this to happen.
It also recommended increasing the amount available within the Boiler Upgrade Scheme to match the entire cost of a heat pump.
The report said the limited scale of the scheme, which only provides sufficient funding to fit around 30,000 heat pumps per annum, will do little to encourage new installers to enter the market. This will create problems further down the line in 2026 when there will need for a “far larger number” of installers than are being trained currently.
The scheme should also be broadened to allow the use of liquid biofuels, the report said. Allowing more heating decarbonisation options will boost buy-in by consumers in off-grid homes, many of whom are older, rather than “imposing from above a certain pre-determined solution that may not suit everyone’s circumstances”.
The report warned that unless understanding of heat decarbonisation agenda is given time to develop, off-grid households may feel “penalised” for being targeted to switch off first, which will risk “eroding” support.
Jonathan Werran, chief executive of Localis, said: “Commercial and domestic heating is in the frontline of this epochal shift in the everyday which will have profound implications for millions of households. Like many national top-down agendas, the policy corridor for this remains stubbornly urban.
“However, in trialling the transition to clean heat methods, the pioneering areas are those which lie off the mains gas grid – and in consequence rely on alternative sources, frequently expensive to heat their homes.”