Green Finance Institute assembles businesses for zero-carbon heat taskforce

17th September 2020 | Commercial Energy

The Green Finance Institute has convened representatives of dozens of businesses alongside experts from local authorities, policy and science for a new taskforce tasked with decarbonising heating systems in the UK. Launched in recognition of the fact that heating and hot water for homes account for almost two-fifths of the UK’s annual energy consumption and one-fifth of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the Zero-Carbon Heating Taskforce will conduct a review into the barriers and enablers for investment into low-carbon heating across the UK’s housing sector.

Using the results of the review, the Green Finance Institute will develop and launch new financial products to help attract investment. It will also advise government departments on which policy changes could scale up the market for low-carbon domestic heat in line with the national net-zero target. At present, the nation is off track to meet a target for converting 12% of UK homes to renewable heat by the end of 2020. Current trajectories tracked by the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) team suggest the proportion will reach 8-10%.

Green Finance Institute

All members of the new Taskforce are partaking in the Institute’s Coalition for the Energy Efficiency of Buildings (CEEB). Businesses represented include British Gas owner Centrica, Eon, Engie and Octopus Energy. Policy experts hail from organisations including Defra, the Scottish Government, the Welsh Government and E3G. Finance firms represented include BNP Paribas, Legal & General, Lloyds and Santander, with councils including the Greater London Authority and the Greater Manchester Combined Authority also sitting in the panel.

The Green Finance Institute’s chief executive Dr Rhian-Mari Thomas called the creation of the Taskforce a “natural next step” in its work to “create financial pathways to the wide-scale adoption of retrofitting across all residential tenures. Decarbonising the way we heat our buildings over the next 10 years is presently one of the largest policy and investment gaps to meeting the UK’s domestic carbon budgets,” E3G’s programme lead for heating, cooling and energy efficiency Pedro Guertler said.

More information available on the website below

https://www.edie.net/news/16/Green-Finance-Institute-assembles-businesses-for-zero-carbon-heat-taskforce/