RHI: £25 Million For Low Carbon Heat

A second phase of the Renewable Heat Premium Payment (RHPP) scheme, which provides vouchers towards renewable technologies like biomass boilers, air and ground source heat pumps and solar thermal panels, launched on 2nd April and will is worth £10m more than the existing scheme.

 

This phase includes an £8M competition for communities to apply for grants to encourage community groups to install renewable heating. This voucher scheme which will be mainly focused on the four million homes in Great Britain which are not heated by mains gas and are reliant on expensive oil or electric heating. There will also be a £10m competition for social landlords.

 

Following on from the controversy surrounding lowering the FITS generation tariff at short notice DECC has also launched a consultation proposing an interim measure to keep the RHI within the budgetary limits set by the Comprehensive Spending Review. This includes the possibility of giving industry one month’s notice to temporarily suspend the scheme to new entrants if 80% of the available budget is expected to be spent. In the interests of transparency and ensuring industry is not taken by surprise, regular updates on the budget spend will be published. These measures could be in place as early as the summer and will last until the longer term cost control system is in place. DECC will consult in September this year about increasing the number of technologies eligible under the industrial RHI with a view to implementing the plans by summer next year.

Under the scheme which ended on 31^st March, 6412 vouchers to households were issued and £4.8m allocated.