Cavity Wall Insulation and Loft Insulation have received a lot of attention of late, with regards to lowering property carbon emissions in the UK’s leaky housing stock. With the government announcing that the UK’s energy bills will be reduced by £50, on the face of it, the deal sounds good, till you look at the overall increase in energy bills year on year.
Cavity Wall Insulation and Loft Insulation are installed in properties that are omitting carbon emissions into the environment. It is designed to keep the heat generated in the property, insulated for a longer period of time. The idea is that it will keep your home warmer for longer and cheaper.
With the recent Energy Companies Obligation (ECO) coming under close scrutiny, homes across the UK are being informed that the Cavity Wall Insulation & Loft Insulation grants that were readily available will now be extended over two more years. On the fact of it, this seems like a good deal to homeowners, it is NOT.
Extending the Energy Companies Obligation (ECO) means that the amount of properties that the Big Six Energy Companies had to insulate for free are now extended over two more years. Two more years on ECO does not mean that more homeowners will be given the Free Grants, it is in fact the exact amount of properties needing to be insulated just dragged out over a longer period of time.
This means that the energy companies can recoup their losses on ECO by receiving their yearly profits from rising energy bills. Even with the reduction on energy bills, there will still be an overall increase on each individual homeowners energy bills.
UK’s housing stock is amongst the most energy ‘leaky’ properties in Europe and the UK faces £30 billion fines if they do not hit their targets by 2015-2017.
Therefore the recent Autumn Statement begs the question, who does the ECO extension really benefit is it the energy companies or the homeowners in the UK?
Clearly homeowners will still receive their Free Grants, albeit potentially two years later than they could have received it. However, the main winner of this situation are the Energy Companies. They will see a further 24 months of profits that will allow them to recoup the costs of the Energy Companies Obligation (ECO).