Thursday, July 19, 2012
Richard Lloyd (Executive Director, Which?), Nick Molho (Head of
Energy Policy, WWF), John Sauven (Executive Director,
GreenpeaceUK), John Sinfield (Managing Director, Knauf Insulation)
and Dot Gibson (General Secretary, National Pensioners Convention)
have written a
joint letter to the Energy Secretary Ed Davey on the Green
Deal, warning him on the dangers of the Government's current
plans.
17 July 2012
Rt. Hon. Ed Davey MP
Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change
Department for Energy and Climate Change
3 Whitehall Place
London
SW1A 2AW
2nd July 2012
Dear Secretary of State
We all agree that investment in energy efficiency is vitally
important and we were encouraged by the commitment to action in
this area from both you and the Prime Minister. It helps people to
cut their energy bills, tackles fuel poverty, reduces carbon
emissions and stimulates growth and employment. However, in
its current form, we believe that the Green Deal and Energy Company
Obligation (ECO) risks not delivering for consumers, the economy or
the environment.
The Impact Assessment for the Green Deal predicts a significant
fall in uptake of loft and cavity wall insulation, and that job
losses in this sector are likely. This means that you propose
forging ahead with a policy that could have a devastating impact,
not only on consumers' ability to cut their energy bills, but also
on the home insulation industry, while seriously undermining
attempts to cut carbon emissions.
We therefore urge you to extend support for low-cost,
high-impact measures - such as loft and cavity wall insulation -
even further, particularly during the transitional period. Millions
of homes still need loft and cavity wall insulation, which are
among the most cost effective ways of cutting energy bills and
delivering carbon savings.
We also believe the reduction in funding for energy efficiency
support for the fuel poor is also a matter of considerable concern
so we want to see a greater share of ECO funding explicitly
targeted towards tackling fuel poverty.
Finally, we urge you to invest in large-scale pilot programmes
and innovation to ensure that a sound basis is provided to allow
the solid wall insulation market to develop over time.
There is still time to save the Green Deal from failing to
achieve its positive and ambitious aims. But if improvements
are not made now, the Green Deal could fail on all fronts.
Yours sincerely
Richard Lloyd
Executive Director, Which?
Nick Molho
Head of Energy Policy, WWF
John Sauven
Executive Director, GreenpeaceUK
John Sinfield
Managing Director, Knauf Insulation
Dot Gibson
General Secretary, National Pensioners
Convention