Mr Davey said that the government and industry still faces the challenge of how to make “energy efficiency real and relevant to people’s everyday lives” admitting that progress on the Green Deal remains disappointing.
“People are still not convinced that there is anything personally they can do” Mr Davey said, “and so it is the challenge of government and industry to convince them to take action.”
The government will therefore improve two of its key policies in order to respond to that challenge, specifically the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) and the Green Deal.
“Our shared ambition is to build one of the least wasteful, most energy efficient, most climate friendly societies in the developed world” said Mr Davey. “And to drive home that ambition we will all need to work together to help your customers - our citizens - the families and households of Britain – to bring about a radical change in the way they approach powering and heating their homes.”
Around half of all homes in the UK still don’t have condensing boilers fitted, seven and a half million homes need more roof insulation, five million homes are not fully double glazed and almost 1.5 million have no double glazing at all. Another five million homes need cavity wall insulation with almost eight million solid wall homes remain untreated. Furthermore, at least one million homes need to be upgraded under ECO and the Green Deal by the end of the next financial year according to the government’s target.
The Energy Secretary announced a new consultation on the Energy Company Obligation which includes a series of proposed changes designed to reduce costs for suppliers and thereby reduce the impact on bills for customers. The government will also deliver longer-term certainty for investors to enable proper business planning. ECO will be extended through to 2017 with new targets from 2015 to 2017 and the two fuel poverty elements will be extended for an additional two years.
On the Green Deal the government will create a single route through the scheme for consumers in order to enable them to get the energy efficiency advice and upgrades they want whether that is through ECO, Green Deal or self-financed. The government will also act to create a healthy market place of companies that can deliver the improvements needed as well as providing attractive incentives with access to a finance package that makes sense for individual consumers.
A simple online Home Energy Tool is already available to help people check quickly what type of improvements would benefit them and what support they can get, but the government will also be stripping away levels of red tape in order to make the acquisition of a Green Deal finance plan easier. This will incoude amendments to the Consumer Credit Act allowing the same Green Deal finance plan to be offered to all customers irrespective of what housing tenure they have.
The government is also set to launch the domestic Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) in the spring and is aiming for a target of every home and small business in Britain to be in control of their energy use through smart electricity and gas meters by 2020.
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