“The next five years have all got to be about innovation… We’re not going to get that from the big six, who have no interest in real energy efficiency. My biggest mistake was taking the big six at face value in the early years of this parliament when they said they were interested in energy efficiency. Absolute rubbish. They are not.”
Strong words from climate change minister and one-time champion of the Green Deal, Greg Barker, this week. But is his accusation fair?
Barker is really making two claims. First, that the big six failed to embrace the Green Deal; second, that they are not interested in energy efficiency. These are two separate issues, and while the major energy companies may be guilty as charged on one, the second does not necessarily follow.
Certainly, the big six did not greet the Green Deal with great enthusiasm. But could this be because they believed the politically motivated, Whitehall-designed scheme to be doomed from the start? The complexity of the payback mechanism, the government’s half-hearted attempt at a national ad campaign, the 11th hour abandonment of the Golden Rule… The Green Deal was dead on arrival and it seems unfair to expect energy companies to shoulder the blame.
The second claim, that the big retailers are not interested in energy efficiency, is harder to substantiate. Early adoption of smart meters, technologies allowing remote thermostat control – these suggest that at least some of the big six see the business opportunity. The companies are also on course to meet their 2015 Energy Company Obligation targets. Admittedly, these were watered down – but that was, again, a political decision.
Perhaps the real problem is that competitive companies in an open market, answerable to their shareholders, are being expected to deliver policy objectives and then blamed when, for political reasons, they go wrong.