19 April 2012: The Government’s Renewable Heat Premium Payment (RHPP) scheme operates for a limited period prior to the introduction of the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) – and provides money to householders to help buy renewable heating technologies – solar thermal panels, heat pumps and biomass boilers.
For solar thermal products, any householder in England, Scotland and Wales can apply – hence the grants are applicable to Londoners. However, for ground to water, air to water or water to water heat pumps, and for biomass boilers, householders without gas central heating in England, Scotland and Wales can apply (in other words those who are not connected to the gas grid and currently rely on fuels such as oil, liquid gas, solid fuel or electricity for their heating).
The Energy Saving Trust (EST) manages the scheme and have just produced statistics showing the installation of Renewable Heat Premium Payment technologies by region. A total of 74 installations were installed in London out of a total of 5,369 installations across England, Scotland and Wales (just over 1%). The breakdown in London is as follows:
- Air Source Heat Pump – 21
- Ground or Water Source Heat Pump – 2
- Solar Thermal – 51