4 Energy efficiency and heating - area-based measures

Warm Zones – England

4.1 Warm Zones is a not-for-profit company and a wholly owned subsidiary of National Energy Action, the English national fuel poverty charity.

Warm Zones deliver affordable warmth to low-income and other vulnerable households, as well as energy efficiency measures for the able-to-pay.

4.2 The approach of individual Zones and their operators varies but they characteristically involve the systematic identification of the fuel poverty and energy efficiency status of all the households in an area and the coordinated, customer focused, delivery of energy efficiency improvements and related services to low-income and other vulnerable households through referrals to Warm Front and delivery of CERT measures. Other services can include income maximisation, energy and debt advice, water saving and security measures, smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors. The Zones also provide employment opportunities for local people.

4.3 During 2007/08 Warm Zones successfully delivered a number of projects supported through the Defra Community Energy Efficiency Fund. This funding enabled the development of a number of new Zones and allowed existing Zones to expand their services. Three new Zones have been launched in North Tyneside, South Tyneside and the Northfields area of Birmingham, bringing the current total of operational Zones to eleven, with further zones at development stage. Warm Zones now operate across 35 local authority areas in England, covering more than one million homes and a population in excess of two million.

4.4 To date Warm Zones have now assessed more than 600,000 properties and delivered over £50 million of major energy efficiency improvements in almost 130,000 homes. In addition it has made referrals to Warm Front for grants totalling more than £21 million.

4.5 For more details see www. warm zones. co . u k.

Low Carbon Buildings Programme – England and Wales

4.6 As the Community Energy Solutions activity has shown, microgeneration technologies can offer an efficient, cost-effective alternative to mainstream fuels for communities without access to mains gas. In May, the Government announced a new pilot project that will create a fuel poverty workstream within the Low Carbon Buildings Programme. £3 million will be made available in Wales and three English Regional Development Agencies, to fund the purchase of microgeneration technologies and their installation in households in deprived communities.

4.7 The projects will be delivered between 2008 and 2010 by community interest companies reporting to the Regional Development Agencies in England and, to the Welsh Assembly in Wales. The projects involve not just the purchase and installation of technologies, but a whole community, whole house approach, in which individual households receive detailed energy efficiency and benefits assessments to ensure that their homes are properly insulated and that their income is maximised. As well as helping individual households, this activity will test the scope for a wider programme.

4.8 The revenue support provided by BERR’s partners will also enable the development of mains gas projects, where appropriate. There is scope for the community interest companies to co-operate in work with the Gas Distribution Networks in this part of the activity.

Community Energy Efficiency Fund – England

4.9 The Community Energy Efficiency Fund launched in June 2007, invited applicants to apply for support for projects working to develop cost effective options for the delivery of Warm Front and the Energy Efficiency Commitment and CERT on a local basis.

4.10 Defra has funded 49 projects totalling over £6 million under the Community Energy Efficiency Fund. As these area-based initiatives understand the needs of their community, they can produce targeted, tailor-made advice and get immediate results at the doorsteps of those who really need them. The scheme’s original aim was to reach 300,000 of the most vulnerable households but the successful projects are now predicted to reach 600,000 vulnerable households across England during the next 3 years.

Community Energy Savings Programme – Great Britain

4.11 On 11 September the Government announced that it is proposing a new community-based programme to install energy efficiency measures, targeted at the country’s poorest communities. It is intended to support new and existing partnerships of local councils, voluntary organisations and energy suppliers to go street-by-street through communities offering free and discounted central

heating, energy efficiency measures and benefit checks. This programme proposes putting a new obligation on energy suppliers and electricity generators. It is envisaged that around 100 new community schemes might be created.

Local Authority Indicators – England and Wales

4.12 In England, National Indicator (NI)187 measures progress in tackling fuel poverty through the improved energy efficiency of households. It has been designed to measure the proportion of households on income related benefits for whom an energy assessment of their housing has been carried out and have a SAP of below 35 or greater than 65. This is ensuring energy efficiency is tackled in the most energy inefficient households and also measures progress towards achieving a SAP of 65.

4.13 40 Local Area Agreements (LAAs) have included NI 187 as one of the 35 local improvement targets and have set challenging but achievable targets in negotiation with the Government Office (GO). Additionally, a number have adopted NI187 as a local indicator.

4.14 The Assembly Government is also developing a local area fuel poverty indicator for Wales, which should assist national and local government in identifying areas with the highest concentrations of fuel poverty. Work on the indicator is being led by the Centre for Sustainable Energy and is expected to be completed in autumn 2008.

Helping households off the gas grid – Great Britain

4.15 As part of the post-2008 Gas Distribution Price Control,

Ofgem decided to incentivise companies to provide connections to deprived communities currently off the gas network. Ofgem is now finalising the guidelines under which the Gas Distribution Networks can take this forward, but Ofgem and the Government anticipate that up to 360 communities across Great Britain will benefit if the Networks respond to the incentivisation that is being offered.

4.16 BERR, with support from National Grid, has carried out a number of pilots in England that have involved designing, developing and delivering projects in deprived communities outside the mains gas network. These have principally involved the provision of gas connections where they are economically viable. This work has underlined the importance of the whole community/whole house approach.

4.17 This work has now been expanded with the development of a model through which mains gas and renewable projects can be delivered to communities on a regional basis. A community interest company, Community Energy Solutions (CES), has been established to

undertake two programmes, one in the North East and one in Yorkshire and Humberside, which have been given funding from central government and the local Regional Development Agencies. Using initial funding of £4 million plus private and public sector contributions, by 2009 CES will have assisted at least 4,000 households in 40 communities through gas network extensions and the installation of renewable technologies, particularly air-source and ground-source heat pumps, on an economically viable basis.

 4.18 In September 2007, Domestic Energy Solutions, a subsidiary of CES,

received support under Defra’s Community Energy Efficiency Fund (CEEF) programme for a project to target 330,000 homes in deprived communities throughout North East England. This project is expected to give benefits and energy efficiency assessments to 180,000 homes and provide measures to 130,000 vulnerable households.

4.19 In Scotland over 2006-08 £1 million was allocated to a pilot project to install renewable technologies in low income households off the gas grid with no or very inefficient heating systems, in order to evaluate the costs and benefits of including these technologies in mainstream programmes. An interim report was published in November 2007 and is available at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/ 2007/11/21152714/0. A final report with a fuller analysis of the costs and benefits of including renewable technologies in fuel poverty programmes will be published shortly.