Statement on Pre-Budget Report

Responding to the announcement of boiler scrappage scheme in today’s Pre-Budget Report, Philip Sellwood, Chief Executive of the Energy Saving Trust said:
“We welcome this initiative. There are around four million G-rated gas boilers in the UK and if these were all replaced with A-rated boilers it would save almost 4.5 million tonnes of CO2 per year, the equivalent of 830,000 household’s emissions, so the scheme announced today has real promise.
“Upgrading to an A-rated condensing boiler already has the great incentive of saving £310 a year from bills, but in a recession, further financial incentive will always be useful in initiating such changes en-masse – something that needs to happen if we are to hit ambitious carbon reduction targets.
“The new trade-in discount will help overcome some of the up-front cost of upgrading to a new, significantly more efficient boiler and so provide even more reason to make the change.
“We also welcome the announcement that if householders produce enough energy to export back on to the grid, that this will be tax free. This will act as a real incentive for when feed-in-tariffs come in April 2010.”

Ends

For more information or to arrange an interview with an Energy Saving Trust spokesperson, please contact Gary Hartley - 020 7654 2611 gary.hartley@est.org.uk or Julian Roberts - 020 7654 2455 julian.roberts@est.org.uk