Our homes are nowhere near ready for net zero – and

By Dr Keith Baker, member of the Common Weal Energy Policy Group and research fellow at the Department of Civil Engineering and Environmental Management, Glasgow Caledonian University

IF Scotland had the powers and access to finance, by far the best way to get Scotland’s homes ready for net zero would be a major programme of public works so households don’t individually have to foot the bill.

In the absence of that, the cost is going to fall on you and the way that will happen is through the Heat in Buildings (HiB) Bill. It is therefore important that the legislation is fit for purpose. It is not.

Way back in 1987, the city of Berkeley in California passed the world’s first Residential Energy Conservation Ordinance (RECO). This, like the HiB, was intended to leverage reductions in greenhouse gas emissions by mandating owners to make energy efficiency upgrades at certain “trigger points” – point of sale, change in tenancy, and extensions of more than 25% of floor area.

The policy was so successful that it was credited with helping California recover from its 2000-2001 electricity crisis, and RECOs have since been adopted by other states and countries.

On the surface, the HiB and a RECO appear very similar, but if energy efficiency regulations were cars, then a RECO has been on Pimp My Ride, whilst the HiB got its engine from a secondhand Lada and I wouldn’t want to trust the wheels in a race to net zero.

A RECO’s engine is the requirement for detailed inspection and certification, something the HiB consultation rules out. The wheels are the measures it covers, something a RECO takes a holistic approach to and ensures that they are realistic and reasonably affordable, whereas the HiB proposes a basic set of six “simple measures” with a vague and potentially very long list of exemptions.

Even putting those exemptions aside, I have tried to come up with defensible numbers for how many homes will be covered by each of the measures, but I’ve largely drawn a blank, and I doubt that Patrick Harvie (the minister responsible) could do any better. Let’s start with one of them, cavity wall insulation (CWI).

The Scottish House Condition Survey reports that as of 2021, 78% of homes

The housing bill falls way short