The UK government’s flagship green heating scheme has been described as “seriously failing” by a Lords inquiry.
The Boiler Upgrade Scheme provides households with £5,000 to assist with the transition from a gas boiler to a low-carbon heat pump.
The Lords Net Zero Committee said that grant take-up is so low that the national target for green heating is “very unlikely” to be met.
The government responded by stating that it would launch a marketing campaign to raise awareness of the scheme.
Heating in UK homes accounts for nearly 17% of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions, which cause climate change.
To meet the UK’s climate change targets, the government wants to install 600,000 low-carbon heat pumps per year within five years, up from 50,000 currently installed.
The Boiler Upgrade Scheme was designed to jump-start the heat pump industry in England and Wales while also lowering installation costs for homeowners.
However, in her letter to the government, Lord Parminter, chair of the Lords Committee, chastised ministers for not doing enough to raise awareness of the scheme, which is on track to issue only half of the allocated grants.
She told the BBC: “The scheme isn’t working as well as it needs to. It is absolutely critical that the government boosts public awareness… we need to give people the confidence to know about why these changes are important.”
The Lords Committee for Environment and Climate Change said the government needed to expand the programme to match this scale and also guarantee that the unspent funding from Year 1 of the BUS – which they estimate at about £75m – would roll over to subsequent years.
The government declined to comment on what would happen to this unspent funding.