Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to encourage the installation of heat pumps.

The Government takes the role heat pumps can have in driving down carbon emissions very seriously and has set an ambitious target of 600,000 heat pump installations a year by 2028. BEIS are currently supporting heat pump deployment via both the Domestic and Non-Domestic Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI). As per November 2020 the total number of Non-Domestic RHI accredited applications for heat pump based installations was 2,500 and 62,492 in the Domestic RHI.

BEIS are also providing support via the Future Homes Standard, which will ensure that new homes are built zero carbon-ready without the need for costly retrofitting, a new market-based policy which puts industry at the heart of efforts to develop the heat pump market, our commitment to phase out the installation of high-carbon fossil-fuel heating off the gas grid through targeted regulation, and a range of other policies such as the Home Upgrade Grant and Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund. We are planning to publish consultations on the market mechanism and off-gas-grid regulations in due course, alongside the forthcoming Heat and Buildings Strategy.

As part of the £1.5 billion Green Homes Grant (GHG) scheme, the government will fund up to two-thirds of the cost of installing low-carbon heat (including air source, ground source and hybrid heat pumps) and energy efficiency measures in homes. Under the scheme, the government aims to retrofit 600,000 homes in England and to date, over 60,000 applications have been received.