If you were Chancellor....

[NSS]

... how would you use some of the post-April '23 reduction in energy cap funding to promote energy efficiency improvements?

[jonM]

New builds are an easy win. Proper airtightness by design (not just a bit of silicon), MVHR and ASHP's would make a big difference to the energy efficiency in addition to improving air quality and addressing condensation issues. 

[NSS]

22 minutes ago, jonM said:

New builds are an easy win. Proper airtightness by design (not just a bit of silicon), MVHR and ASHP's would make a big difference to the energy efficiency in addition to improving air quality and addressing condensation issues. 

The big builders won't play ball on that front at present. They're share prices have taken a hammering and rising mortgage rates on top of increased material/labour costs mean their profit margins are already under pressure.

 

Surely the biggest problem is the old and inefficient housing stock? How do you incentivise owners/landlords to improve those properties?

[Iceverge]

Allow anyone to knock and rebuild a house without planning provided it would fit into the same "box". 

 

No planning limits on solar panels. 

 

No planning limits on external insulation/triple glazing/external blinds. 

 

No Aircon without solar PV. 

 

V5 style deed of transfer and government house "MOT" to allow peeps to sell their old icebox house simply. 

 

Encapsulate entire uninsulated streets in a giant polytunnel. 

[SteamyTea]

6 hours ago, Iceverge said:

Encapsulate entire uninsulated streets in a giant polytunnel. 

That would stop the woodburns.

6 hours ago, Iceverge said:

V5 style deed of transfer

Yes, not sure how it would actually work in practice, but it seems to me that solicitors are constantly surprised when asked to sell a house.

[NSS]

2 hours ago, SteamyTea said:

That would stop the woodburns.

Article on the regional TV news last night talking to a WBS supplier who said demand is off the scale at present.

[NSS]

9 hours ago, Iceverge said:

Allow anyone to knock and rebuild a house without planning provided it would fit into the same "box". 

 

No planning limits on solar panels. 

 

No planning limits on external insulation/triple glazing/external blinds. 

 

No Aircon without solar PV. 

 

V5 style deed of transfer and government house "MOT" to allow peeps to sell their old icebox house simply. 

 

Encapsulate entire uninsulated streets in a giant polytunnel. 

 

 

 

Much as some of those ideas would be useful, changing rules alone doesn't make efficency gains more affordable, at least not for those who can least afford to make such improvements.

 

I was thinking more along the lines of...

 

If your household income is under £X and you spend £y (up to say £500) on energy efficiency products (loft insulation, led bulbs, secondary glazing, etc), you'll get £2y deducted from your current year's energy bill.

 

Edited to add, it could work on a sliding scale such that as household earnings increase the deduction from your energy bill reduces.

Edited October 18, 2022 by NSS

[SteamyTea]

23 minutes ago, NSS said:

 

If your household income is under £X and you spend £y (up to say £500) on energy efficiency products (loft insulation, led bulbs, secondary glazing, etc), you'll get £2y deducted from your current year's energy bill

The trouble is, just basing it on income, it is a blunt tool.

The energy price increase has shown how little people really understand how the energy market works, and, more importantly, how they use energy.

It might be possible to add a surcharge to utility bills for homes below an EPC C.

That then relies on many landlords doing some extra work, which, in our imagined housing crisis, will not work.

In reality, for owner occupiers, it is up to them to do what they want. If they do nothing, they cannot really complain. 

 

It is amazing how much can be saved with small changes.

[andyscotland]

9 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

The trouble is, just basing it on income, it is a blunt tool.

 

It also depends on your objective.

 

If you want to help people with affordability then income may be a useful factor (but makes the scheme much more complex) for targeting limited resources.

 

If the primary aim is energy saving / environment then I'd think "pump-priming" people who can afford to do work but haven't prioritised it is just as important. Especially as (very loosely, excepting pensioners etc) those with higher incomes tend to live in bigger houses & use more energy.

 

In the current context low income folk are already cutting energy consumption by being cold. The real incremental energy savings are to be had from those who see a big number on the bill, moan about it, but have no issue actually paying it.

[SteamyTea]

4 minutes ago, andyscotland said:

The real incremental energy savings are to be had from those who see a big number on the bill, moan about it, but have no issue actually paying it.

Yes, and they are probably in the majority.

Not sure how to change that, environmental taxes has not worked, nor the recent price increases.

Ritual Public Humiliation fails as well.

 

[andyscotland]

23 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Yes, and they are probably in the majority.

Not sure how to change that, environmental taxes has not worked, nor the recent price increases.

Ritual Public Humiliation fails as well.

 

 

I think probably only incentives. In my experience, the wealthy love a bargain/free money.

 

From a financial fairness point of view, it sticks in the craw, but from an environment/energy point of view I think you just have to have an open-access fund to subsidise/reward costs of energy saving enhancements to existing buildings with the only conditions being on the nature/level of energy savings.

 

I would also make any scheme allow for DIY self-install (maybe with a quick inspection/photos before and after) for simple things - there are loads of folk who could just fit some draught strips/loft roll rather than paying for a contractor & their markup.

 

The other advantage of a universal scheme is it is then much easier to market nationwide and that is likely to help uptake.

 

The one saving grace of paying the rich to improve their mansions is that if it reduces peak demand so that we don't need gas backup as often that will in theory make everyone's bills cheaper.

[SteamyTea]

5 minutes ago, andyscotland said:

sticks in the craw

It does, and any environmental savings are just lost in other areas.

 

It may be too early to tell how much energy the UK saves by the higher prices, but going to make interesting reading this time next year.

At least most of us now understand the concept of 'excess deaths', even if many deny the conclusions.

[Adsibob]

11 hours ago, Iceverge said:

Encapsulate entire uninsulated streets in a giant polytunnel. 

this isn't such a bad idea. Would it work though?

[Ferdinand]

1 hour ago, SteamyTea said:

The trouble is, just basing it on income, it is a blunt tool.

The energy price increase has shown how little people really understand how the energy market works, and, more importantly, how they use energy.

It might be possible to add a surcharge to utility bills for homes below an EPC C.

That then relies on many landlords doing some extra work, which, in our imagined housing crisis, will not work.

In reality, for owner occupiers, it is up to them to do what they want. If they do nothing, they cannot really complain. 

 

It is amazing how much can be saved with small changes.

 

Landlords are already pretty much regulated to have their properties C or better within a very few years. I think there is debate about 2028 or 2030. D is required by 2025, and not to have it is an offence.

 

The main problem is with existing older stock in the Owner Occupied sector. The problem there is that the last 3 Governments have been cowards on that question.

 

I'd suggest higher stamp duty, and an extra band or two of Council Tax.

 

Overall the average EPC is now just reaching into C - last time I looked it was 67-68.

[markc]

Shouldn’t it be personal choice? My old railway property has solid stone walls and cellars and while I have improved it I do not want to spoil the inside or outside with bubble wrap. I choose to use a little more gas and electricity and keep the buildings character. When I find a plot to build a new place then yes it will be very efficient.

[Ferdinand]

2 hours ago, NSS said:

 

Much as some of those ideas would be useful, changing rules alone doesn't make efficency gains more affordable, at least not for those who can least afford to make such improvements.

 

I was thinking more along the lines of...

 

If your household income is under £X and you spend £y (up to say £500) on energy efficiency products (loft insulation, led bulbs, secondary glazing, etc), you'll get £2y deducted from your current year's energy bill.

 

Edited to add, it could work on a sliding scale such that as household earnings increase the deduction from your energy bill reduces.

 

I don't see why this needs to be subsidised - except for say the bottom 20%, which has always had significant support.

 

But an average property owner has an extra 50k or so on the value of their property in the last 3 years, driven by tax breaks.

 

For those, just set a high standard and enforce it.

 

4 minutes ago, markc said:

Shouldn’t it be personal choice? My old railway property has solid stone walls and cellars and while I have improved it I do not want to spoil the inside or outside with bubble wrap. I choose to use a little more gas and electricity and keep the buildings character. When I find a plot to build a new place then yes it will be very efficient.

 

I'd say that it is quite reasonable for there to be obligations to balance your chosen benefits.

We have accepted that causing more emissions should carry extra costs as a principle. See carbon taxes and so on.

 

I can't see a reason for not applying that to people who choose inefficient houses, and opt to keep them less efficient.

 

[andyscotland]

9 minutes ago, Ferdinand said:

 

I don't see why this needs to be subsidised - except for say the bottom 20%, which has always had significant support.

 

But an average property owner has an extra 50k or so on the value of their property in the last 3 years, driven by tax breaks.

 

For those, just set a high standard and enforce it.

 

This is a fair point. I think in Scotland the plan is to make it that you can't sell a house without getting it up to an EPC C, with funding available to support those that have financial need, which may help.

 

9 minutes ago, Ferdinand said:

I'd say that it is quite reasonable for there to be obligations to balance your chosen benefits.

We have accepted that causing more emissions should carry extra costs as a principle. See carbon taxes and so on.

 

I can't see a reason for not applying that to people who choose inefficient houses, and opt to keep them less efficient.

 

Agreed. The other idea floating that may help there is for everyone to get "affordable" energy up to a certain reasonable limit, and for cost to rise significantly as you go above that. Which partly works with the concept that without the high-demand users, the rest of us could probably manage more of the time with renewables and with existing/lighter-weight grid infrastructure. So the premium on choosing to have an inefficient property starts to reflect the incremental cost of supplying power to it, rather than that being averaged into everyone's bills.

[SteamyTea]

3 minutes ago, andyscotland said:

Agreed. The other idea floating that may help there is for everyone to get "affordable" energy up to a certain reasonable limit, and for cost to rise significantly as you go above that

We used to have the reverse, with the unit cost coming down the more you used.

Most of my energy is used at night, all that has happened is that unit price has tripled.

 

Rather than using an EPC, how about showing energy bills for the previous 3 years. There will always be exceptions (long term empty) and variances, but if you can compare to the local neighborhood (which you can currently already do), then you can make a better informed decision.

Not that people really know what they are looking at. Even on here people talk about how much cash they spend and how much they can save by changing suppliers, but only a few of us nerds talk about the actual energy used.  

[andyscotland]

22 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Rather than using an EPC, how about showing energy bills for the previous 3 years. There will always be exceptions (long term empty) and variances, but if you can compare to the local neighborhood (which you can currently already do), then you can make a better informed decision.

 

I do like that idea, on the one hand much more straightforward/realistic than an EPC. But could introduce a lot of problems. I suspect we - family of 4 and both working from home - use a lot more energy than the old lady down the road (with identical construction) who only heats one room with a radiant heater when she feels a bit chilly, is only using hot water when her carers wash her, and eats mostly microwave meals.

 

It would be very hard for a prospective buyer to figure out what was going on with either of our houses (and how it would correlate to their own likely usage) without understanding quite a lot about who is living in the house and how, I think? And that becomes even more of a problem if you're trying to compare neighbourhood figures. Ours is a move-here-young-then-stay-till-you-die area so the variation between types of neighbours is huge and changes all the time.

 

22 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Not that people really know what they are looking at. Even on here people talk about how much cash they spend and how much they can save by changing suppliers, but only a few of us nerds talk about the actual energy used.

 

This is very true, although I think there would be ways of presenting the energy in a comparable/understandable way if that was prioritised.

Edited October 18, 2022 by andyscotland

[SteamyTea]

6 minutes ago, andyscotland said:

But could introduce a lot of problems

You have answered it yourself.

 

6 minutes ago, andyscotland said:

I think there would be ways of presenting the energy in a comparable/understandable way if that was prioritised

 

I suggest the relevant points from the Physics GCSE.

 

Real trouble is, too many people would meddle with it that it becomes pointless, which is what has happened to all the schemes introduced by the government/LA.

 

[Ferdinand]

37 minutes ago, andyscotland said:

 

I do like that idea, on the one hand much more straightforward/realistic than an EPC. But could introduce a lot of problems. I suspect we - family of 4 and both working from home - use a lot more energy than the old lady down the road (with identical construction) who only heats one room with a radiant heater when she feels a bit chilly, is only using hot water when her carers wash her, and eats mostly microwave meals.

 

It would be very hard for a prospective buyer to figure out what was going on with either of our houses (and how it would correlate to their own likely usage) without understanding quite a lot about who is living in the house and how, I think? And that becomes even more of a problem if you're trying to compare neighbourhood figures. Ours is a move-here-young-then-stay-till-you-die area so the variation between types of neighbours is huge and changes all the time.

 

 

That was one of the key debates around the introduction of EPCs, and their definition.

Do you go for "fabric" so you can compare it, or "usage" where you may get a better idea or be firmly misled?

 

It's really the same debate as OFGEM and media quoting "typical" bills when actually the cap is on unit-rates and 3 defined 'typical' cases (low, medium, high) exist if you look 2 cm beyond the end of your nose.

 

You can't win. Especially in the UK where the media is driven by maximising moaning and Outrage Buses.

 

F

[markc]

 

I can't see a reason for not applying that to people who choose inefficient houses, and opt to keep them less efficient.

while my house may be less efficient than others, I use very little energy … possibly half of what many others on here use, so why should I be penalised for using less energy than an efficient house does.

[Radian]

I would like to see a low interest loan scheme for financing energy saving measures that is applied to a property rather than an individual. Many measures have paybacks that take years to achieve and with people moving on average every 7 years, there is little incentive to invest. People of pension age also have other time related issues to contend with. But by enabling the self-financing of energy improvements the governments long term commitments can be met at minimal cost.

[SteamyTea]

7 hours ago, Radian said:

I would like to see a low interest loan scheme for financing energy saving measures that is applied to a property rather than an individual.

Wasn't that already tried, and was a total failure.  Who remembers The Green Bank.

 

One quick, cheap and easy way would be to drop objections to onshore generation projects.  Let wind, solar and hydro compete with bio-gas, coal, nuclear and gas.

[Gone West]

1 hour ago, SteamyTea said:

One quick, cheap and easy way would be to drop objections to onshore generation projects.  Let wind, solar and hydro compete with bio-gas, coal, nuclear and gas.

The solution isn't generating more energy, it's reducing domestic energy usage which would be helped by a sensible scheme to improve existing housing stock, as @Radian says. Then people can live comfortably without using large amounts of energy.