Ban on gas boilers in new homes from 2025
THE installation of new gas boilers to provide heating and hot water is set to be banned in new homes from 2025 – but it could add £5,000 to the average price.
Chancellor Philip Hammond announced the move in response to calls from advisers to take drastic action to limit the nation’s greenhouse gas and carbon emissions.
He told MPs that a new Future Homes Standard would ‘ mandate the end of fossil-fuel heating in new homes by 2025’.
It is one of a number of green measures announced in the Spring Statement which also included proposals to increase the amount of so-called ‘green gas’ in the National Grid to replace natural gas from the North Sea. Green gas – or biomethane – is created from biodegradable material, such as food and farm waste, and is purified and pumped into the pipes for cooking and heating.
There will also be measures to help small businesses cut emissions and a study into carbon offsets for air travtotal ellers, such as tree planting schemes, as part of efforts to move to a carbon-neutral economy.
The Chancellor’s announcement follows a recommendation from the Committee on Climate Change (CoCC),which argued developers should be blocked from connecting homes to the gas grid from 2025. This would have stopped connections for boilers and cookers. Mr Hammond seems to have watered down this proposal by limiting the ban to gas central heating – averting a backlash from those who prefer to use gas for cooking.
He said: ‘To help ensure consumer energy bills are low and homes are better for the environment, the government will introduce a Future Homes Standard by 2025, so that new build homes are future-proofed with low carbon heating and worldleading levels of energy efficiency.’
The most likely replacement for gas are air source heat pumps. These extract heat from the outside air – even in winter – and channel it into a compressor that amplifies the heat which is then used to warm up water for heating, taps and showers.
The pumps are generally combined with extra insulation. However, the cost of including these two elements in a new property is estimated to be about £5,000 more expensive than a gas boiler.
The CoCC claims that air source heat pumps are likely to be costeffective for new homes from as early as 2021. It accepts that these might not heat a home as quickly as a gas boiler, but argues they would be more efficient and the overall level of comfort would be the same.
Another option would be to introduce boilers that can run on hydrogen gas, which only produces water when it burns. However, the technology for home use is in its infancy.
Mike Foster, head of Energy and Utilities Alliance, a trade association representing UK boiler manufacturers, warned if boilers were replaced with electric heaters, rather than air source heat pumps, utility bills could rise. ‘A unit of gas is just under 4p, while a unit of electricity is about 14 to 15p. There’s a real impact on people’s bills,’ he said.
The boss of gas boiler company Worcester Bosch, Carl Arntzen, described the ban as ‘simplistic’ and warned it would create a huge demand for electricity to heat homes and water. He said: ‘If the whole of the country came off gas, we would need the power of around 30 nuclear power stations in this country and currently we have eight.’
Chief executive of the Federation of Master Builders, Brian Berry, said the new rules ‘will bring yet more costs and more delays for builders’.
But Max Wakefield, from campaign group 10:10 Climate Action, said: ‘All our homes and buildings must be made efficient, affordable and zerocarbon within the next two decades to address the climate crisis.’
‘Replaced by heat pumps’