Luke Murphy MP, the chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Climate Change, joined ISEP members and other expert stakeholders at an online roundtable yesterday morning to discuss what policies are needed to improve the energy efficiency of our buildings.
Ben Goodwin, ISEP’s Director of Policy and Public Affairs, looks at the key talking points.
Reducing energy use by having more energy efficient buildings can significantly help us to cut the harmful emissions that are created from generating energy in the first place. It can also mean cheaper energy bills for households and businesses across the country.
Successive policies on retrofitting existing building stock to make it more energy efficient have failed to deliver. For example, the Green Deal and subsequently the Green Homes Grant. There have also been large question marks around the ambition of policies for making future housing more energy efficient e.g. the Future Homes Standard.
Getting both retrofit and new build right on the energy efficiency challenge is key.
In kicking off the roundtable the Climate Change APPG Chair focused on Labour’s manifesto pledge to upgrade five million homes over five years with the £6.6bn Warm Homes Plan, making the case for disparate delivery policies and approaches to be rationalised to do so.
The emerging approach of providing heat as a service (HaaS) was also referred to as the need to think more radically about solutions continues to grow.
HaaS works on the principle that consumers choose how much to spend on the experience they want – feeling warm and comfortable when and where they want in their homes – instead of paying for kilowatt-hours of energy.
Attendees at the roundtable agreed on the need for more ‘outside of the box’ thinking, but pointed to other challenges that have been holding back retrofit policies and efforts at developing good standards for future buildings.
On retrofit specifically, skills shortages and inadequate training provision were cited as prohibitive factors in delivering energy efficiency measures, including high performing insulation and the installation of clean energy solutions such as heat pumps.
Overall, there was a sense that the new government needs to offer clear and long-term policy signals so that the businesses and organisations delivering energy efficiency to the market have the confidence to invest in their ability to do this at scale. The same is true for their supply chains.
On new buildings specifically there was consensus that it is imperative that a fit for purpose Future Homes Standard is developed and delivered by the new government at pace. Particularly given the ambitious house building programme that has been announced.
ISEP is a signatory to the Good Homes Alliance’s campaign for a clear, strong, industry-backed proposal for a better Future Homes Standard.
The Energy Security and Net Zero Committee, which Luke Murphy MP is also a member, is currently running an inquiry on retrofitting homes for net zero. More information on that can be found here.
ISEP’s public affairs roundtable series will be back again in early 2025.
Ben is Director of Policy and Public Affairs at ISEP. In this capacity he looks after the delivery of ISEP's core policy, practice and public affairs activities across a range of environmental and sustainability issues. Prior to joining the organisation Ben worked in several similar policy roles at organisations including the Institution of Civil Engineers and the Renewable Energy Association.
