The new fund launched by energy secretary, Ed Davey, offers householders in England and Wales up to £7,600 towards the cost of energy efficiency improvements from June onwards.
Neil Schofield, head of government and external affairs at Worcester, Bosch Group, said: “It is extremely encouraging to see the government continue to invest in energy efficiency enhancements and the heating and hot water industry will do all it can to ensure this additional funding is put to good use. With this however, comes a frustration that installers remain excluded, which is a familiar story unfortunately.
“Despite the incentive looking very attractive at face value, installer buy-in is crucial, and we still find ourselves in a position where the vast majority of the nation’s 130,000 well-qualified professionals are held back by red tape and the need for costly extra qualifications. DECC’s insistence that Green Deal work is carried out by approved companies means this additional funding simply isn’t accessible to the majority of homeowners, which is a huge frustration.”
He added: “April’s RHI launch coupled with this additional allocation of Green Deal funding could go some way to making energy efficiency measures more attractive to homeowners, but for this to happen, buy-in from the nation’s heating engineers needs to be encouraged quickly.”