The people off the gas grid face very significant challenges, President of National Energy Action (NEA), Charles Hendry explained, and the picture painted in recent NEA report on the matter “is still quite bleak”.
The picture painted by the NEA’s “is still quite bleak” for those off gas grid, he said.
Holly Sims, Corporate Affairs Manager at
Calor Gas, outlined some of the issues that Calor had worked with for the last few years. Around half a million people lived off the gas grid, she explained, resulting in fuel poverty being exacerbated for these homes, with the fuel poverty gap often being double that of homes on the gas grid.
The definition of ‘rural’ homes was problematic, as it was currently far too wide, she said, and spoke about how parts of the Energy Company Obligations (ECO) were not working and needed to be looked at again.
The government had accepted that the obligations were not working, but the steps it was taking to tackle the problem “were not the right ones” she said.
Bringing forward the winter fuel payment would be a “win win” scenario which would be supported by suppliers and consumers alike. However, at the moment “a brick wall” was being hit, with the government saying it was too difficult to collect the data needed.
Galvanising community support was “absolutely key” she believed.
“You have to have hands on assistance in a local way” agreed Conservative MP Guy Opperman.
He described how local oil buying clubs had been established in his own rural constituency of Hexham. These had totally reversed the way oil was bought in the area, he said.
He noted the terrible public take-up rates for energy savings, describing how he had produced information booklets for the public locally. “Slowly but surely we are changing people’s behaviour.”
Additionally he pointed to how enhanced credit union ‘local banks’ had been set up to help people save “for a snowy day.” But it was only local, bottom-up solutions that would work, he stressed.
In off-grid areas, “the market is not working.”
Cheryl Gillian MP emphasised the good work Calor Gas had done in Wales, where households off grid made up around 44% of all households affected by fuel poverty.
Calor had helped to map the fuel poverty in detail across Wales, and subsequently produced an advice pack for consumers for how best to save on their fuel. They went on to train housing association staff and working door-to-door to communicate the message to residents.
Consumer focus demands to make prices more transparent was also key, she said.
“I think a lot of the stuff talked about renewables is complete gobbledygook” she said. There was too much information that was too complex. She called for a clearer message from the government on energy.
“We’ve got fracking coming down the line” she added, and this would exacerbate the problem of off grid households. The best solution to this would be to extend the gas network, she argued.
NEA’s External Affairs Manager Peter Smith explained how the government’s overall approach to reducing some of the burdens energy consumers were facing was welcome, though its actions were not all perfect.
He welcomed the government’s introduction of the renewable heat incentive scheme.
There was a real tension between the most and least affluent households as well, he argued, explaining that there were around 2.3m households with incomes below around £11,000, but these tended to have to pay around £1000 more than the more affluent consumers to heat their homes.
He called for parts of the renewable heat incentive to be ring-fenced, and argued that the additional costs faced by rural households should be recognised by government schemes.
“We have got to recognise there is some urgency behind these issues” he warned, with hundreds of people dying every time the UK suffered a particularly harsh winter.
Janice Banks, chief executive of Action with Communities in Rural England (ACRE) pointed out how rural communities were impacted twice; once for their household fuel, and again for their increased transport costs for travelling further to and from their homes than more urban households.
Banks was clear about the two key issues that existed for rural energy; the cost of fuel and the fuel efficiency of homes.
The current delivery of ECO measures “is not working in rural areas” Banks said. She described how rural consumers were regularly bombarded with phone calls offering deals which they did not trust, and which were difficult to actually follow through with.
There had generally been poor awareness of ECO measures in the public, and the whole way the scheme had been implemented was problematic.
She called for the government to review these measures and “reflect the reality of implementing them in rural areas”. The government should be using more of the trusted networks already in the communities, as well as providing support to consumers who are keen to adapt their behaviour or switching their details.
A representative in the audience from Energy UK noted the difference between energy and heat. He asked whether it was right for the current schemes in place to be paid for by the government, rather than through taxation for instance. Smith was clear that the balance should change from consumer-funded schemes.