Home Energy Efficiency Programmes - Energy Efficient Scotland: delivery report 2018 to 2019

Introduction

The Scottish Government is committed to reducing fuel poverty and improving the energy efficiency of housing in Scotland. The Home Energy Efficiency Programmes for Scotland (HEEPS) Launched in April 2013.

This is the 6th annual summary report of our HEEPS programme. The report focuses on the outcomes achieved from the 2018/2019 programme and also provides an overview of progress since 2013.

Details on delivery through schemes prior to HEEPS and previous Programme reports are available on the Energy Saving Trust website:

https://energysavingtrust.org.uk/

The individual HEEPS schemes are designed to work with other energy efficiency programmes by blending funding, such as the Energy Company Obligation (ECO). This aims to maximise the opportunities available to households and local authorities and enables delivery of higher numbers of, or more expensive projects.

The Fuel Poverty (Targets, Definition and Strategy) (Scotland) Act 2019 received Royal Assent on 18^th July 2019 and included a new definition of fuel poverty based on advice from an independent panel of experts and further scrutiny and amendment by the Scottish Parliament. Best estimates of the new definition from the Scottish House Conditions Survey 2019 (Published December 2020)^[1] indicate:

Fig: 1

Households in Fuel Poverty

Year Total Percentage

2019 613,000 Fuel Poor 24.6%

2019 311,000 Extreme Fuel Poor 12.4%

2018 619,000 25%

Of the 613,000 households in fuel poverty in 2019, 311,000, (12.4%) were living in extreme fuel poverty.

'There has been little change in the fuel poverty rate under this new definition over the past four years, but there has been a reduction from the peak of 31.7%, or 761,000 households, in (2013-The Scottish House Condition Survey 2019)