Like many in the industry, I was expecting oil heating to be left out of the government’s recent response to the ECO3 Consultation and I think we should all be disappointed that this opportunity to move the country away from carbon-intensive oil as a heating source has been missed.
Everyone now knows that using fossil fuels to heat homes must eventually stop and calls for all off gas properties to move away from fossil fuels during the 2020s are already in place as mentioned in the latest report to parliament by CCC.
So leaving oil heating in the mix does not seem to align well with the government’s clean growth strategy but maybe this is just a result of intense lobbying by the declining oil sector.
As a nation though, we urgently have to find more sustainable ways of heating our homes if we are to get anywhere near the carbon reduction targets that have been legally committed to. Not forgetting the significant reduction in running costs that modern, renewable ways of heating offer individual homeowners and businesses.
I can only think that the government was also taking into account any possible remedial energy saving measures that many older homes (and particularly those more likely to be on oil) need to implement before being able to truly benefit from low carbon heating.
We are moving rapidly away from fossil fuels and its difficult to see how much longer oil can and will be supported
Max Halliwell Product Manager for renewable heating
A never ending cycle
The problem with leaving oil as an option though is that we are in danger of creating a never ending cycle.
A lot of oil boiler sales are a result of distressed purchases, where the homeowner is faced with a complete failure or realises that their heating is not going to survive another winter.
We therefore need to get in front of these people long before their heating fails and highlight how adding a renewable heat pump can help them in both the short and the long term.
What I would have hoped to see as part of the current thinking is a programme encouraging homeowners on oil to improve the thermal efficiency of their properties AND plan ahead for the failure of their current oil heating.
When these antiquated, carbon-intensive systems reached the end of their working life, an education or incentive programme would have allowed households to switch to renewables in a much more painless way.
Hybrid option for now
The inclusion of oil heating in the clean growth strategy doesn’t mean that every house with an oil boiler is condemned to always use oil forever and ever though and, as an industry, the renewable sector should be looking at every opportunity to encourage the switchover.
We’ve had a glorious summer but we know how fickle the British weather is and there will be many a household wondering if their oil heating will last another winter.
Now is the time to educate people on the advantages of adding a heat pump to their existing system.
Modern heat pump systems for example will happily work alongside oil boilers with their advanced control system working out when it is best to run the low-carbon heating, or the oil one as this video shows. This installation in is rural Ayreshire which is not always the warmest part of the UK.
