Leading the way in tackling fuel poverty

Release Date: 20-Nov-2008

Bristol City Council is leading the way in tackling fuel poverty and reducing carbon emissions, with a raft of initiatives in place to help both council tenants and homeowners.

A report to the council’s Cabinet on November 27 sets out the work the council is doing to tackle fuel poverty and carbon emissions across all sectors of housing in the city and highlights further improvements that are planned.

Good progress is already being made in improving the energy efficiency of Bristol’s housing. The results from the recent Private Sector House Condition Survey combined with the performance of the council's own homes, those of housing associations and this year's works programme give a city average of 59 - 60 Standard Assessment Procedure points - the scale the Government uses to assess energy efficiency. This score is well above the national average (a rating of 50 is considered ‘good’).

A range of projects and initiatives are already underway in the city to help the environment and residents’ wallets. These include:

Bristol Energy Efficiency Scheme - Targeted at the private sector, measures promoted through this scheme include discounted loft insulation and cavity wall insulation, the distribution of low-energy light bulbs and hot water cylinder jackets.
Warm Front Scheme - This scheme provides grants for a range of energy measures, including new central heating for households in receipt of certain benefits. So far, 569 homes in the city have been successfully referred for a grant for energy saving measures as a result of pro actively promoting the scheme.
Wessex Loan Scheme - This initiative provides low-interest loans for energy-saving works such as double glazing and new heating systems for those households just outside of the benefit eligible works.

Meanwhile, the council's own homes are benefiting from £5 million being spent each year to upgrade heating systems with high efficiency boilers and more than £2 million a year for installing double glazing and enhanced insulation.

There are also plans to trial new air source heat pumps to heat at 24 council homes where mains gas in unavailable this winter. These systems would replace the existing electric heating systems and are extremely efficient, reducing the impact on the environment and slashing costs for tenants.

Another new scheme being planned is to allow householders to borrow electricity monitors from the council that display how much electricity is being used in their home at any one time. The monitors would be available through the library system from January 2009 and would be treated in the same way as borrowing a book.

Councillor Judith Price, Cabinet Member for Homes and Streetscene, said: “The council is committed to helping the environment by reducing carbon emissions while at the same time doing all it can to reduce energy bills in homes.

“Many initiatives are already having a very positive impact and we have an ambitious programme of further improvements in the pipeline that will reduce emissions and energy bills.”

Author:

For all media enquiries relating to this press release, please contact Corporate Communications on 0117 922 2650.

To link to this page directly, use the URL
http://www.bristol.gov.uk/redirect?oid=PressRelease-id-28662062

Subscribe to our free email bulletin service and get the latest news and information about consultations and events happening in the city - www.bristol.gov.uk/newsdirect