Green Homes Grant extended for extra year

Homeowners across England will have until the end of March 2022 to have energy efficiency upgrades to their homes completed through the Green Homes Grant voucher scheme.

The scheme funds up to two-thirds of the cost of green home improvements up to £5,000, or 100% of the cost for homeowners on low incomes, up to £10,000.

Measures covered include insulation of walls, floors and roofs, double or triple glazing when replacing single glazing, and low-carbon heating like heat pumps.

The prime minister announced the extension of both the Green Homes Grant and the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme in his Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution, designed to help the country build back greener and help reach the UK’s target for net zero carbon emissions by 2050.

£1 billion will be available next year into making new and existing homes and public buildings more efficient, including through the Green Homes Grant voucher scheme and the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme.

Chief executive of the Federation of Master Builders Brian Berry said: “This will give the reassurance needed to the building industry to invest in the scheme. Our existing homes contribute 20% of all our carbon emissions and consume 35% of our energy.”

Chief executive of TrustMark Simon Ayers said: “We urge any tradespeople who want to be a part of the Green Homes Grant scheme to apply for TrustMark registration and Microgeneration Certification Scheme or Publicly Accessible Standards certification as soon as possible.”

Talking to Glass Times, Mike Butterick, marketing director at Saint-Gobain Glass, said “An important aspect of the Green Homes Grant scheme is the broader contribution that windows and doors make to a renovation project. Many homeowners investing in primary measures as part of the Green Homes Grant, may also consider it a good time to upgrade their windows and doors, even if they are not single glazed: replacing the replacement is a huge part of our industry.

“If a homeowner is about to undertake a large renovation project such as external or internal wall insulation, then it can be more convenient, more integrated and more cost effective to change the windows at the same time.”