PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Energy: Housing (5 March 2018)

The Government’s Clean Growth Strategy, published in October last year, set out a number of policies and proposals to promote energy efficiency in households. For example:

• The Energy Company Obligation (ECO) places an obligation on energy suppliers to deliver household energy efficiency measures such as cavity wall insulation and loft insulation. Under ECO around 2.2 million energy efficiency measures had been installed in around 1.8 million properties by the end of December 2017
• Government implements minimum energy efficiency standards for many energy using products including lighting, white goods, and boilers. We estimate that these standards, along with product energy labelling, will save around £100 a year on energy bills for the average dual-fuel household in 2020.
• For privately rented homes, new legislation in force from April 2018 means that landlords of the least energy-efficient properties will need to improve those properties to a minimum of Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) Band E before they can be let, lowering bills for some of the most vulnerable private tenants while ensuring costs of improvements are reasonable and affordable. The Government is consulting on steps to make these regulations more effective.
• Alongside the Clean Growth Strategy, the Government published a Call for Evidence on building a market for energy efficiency, which includes additional measures to reduce the cost of investment required to improve homes. This Call for Evidence has now closed and we will publish an action plan on additional market-based measures later in 2018.
• The Government is replacing the existing, telephone-only Energy Saving Advice Service with a digitally-led service, which will be launched in spring 2018. This will offer tailored advice to consumers on improving the energy performance of their homes.