Assessing the effects of energy efficiency policies applied to the UK housing stock

Les Shorrock, Building Research Establishment

Keywords

energy efficiency policies, grants and subsidies, energy labelling and minimum standards, Building Regulations

Abstract

Over the past twenty five years or so, policies to improve energy efficiency in the UK housing stock have generally fallen into three basic categories:

grants and other forms of subsidy
energy labelling and minimum standards (i.e. the market transformation approach)
Building Regulations

This paper examines the effectiveness of each of these three mechanisms using analyses based on market research data and other available statistics. A number of specific examples are presented to clearly illustrate the effects of the individual mechanisms. Variations in effectiveness within the individual mechanisms (e.g. showing the different results achieved by different types of grant and subsidy) are also assessed where possible.

The paper quantifies the overall effectiveness of each mechanism in terms of energy savings and carbon emission reductions. The results show overall carbon emission reductions in 2001 due to these mechanisms of approximately 5 MtC/year, of which grants and subsidies account for 39%, Building Regulations account for 50% and energy labelling and minimum standards account for 11% (made up of about 7.5% due to boiler labelling and 3.5% due to labelling of cold and wet appliances). Not surprisingly, the labelling savings are much less than those for grants/subsidies and Building Regulations because labelling was only introduced in the 1990s whereas the other mechanisms have both been applied since the mid-1970s.