Under the Renewable Heat Premium Payment (RHPP) scheme, funding for social landlords to install renewable heating technologies has been increased to £4 million.
The announcement was made at yesterday’s Solar Power UK 2011 conference in Birmingham, with Greg Barker, the Minister for Energy and Climate Change confirming that funding set aside for social housing has been increased by 33%.
In August, the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) launched the RHPP, the first phase of the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) scheme. An initial pot of £3 million was made available, and housing associations and local authorities were invited to bid for up to £175,000 to help off set the installation costs of renewable heating equipment.
According to the energy minister, 34 projects had made successful applications, but he added that overall interest in the scheme had been somewhat disappointing.
“Take up under the RHPP is marginally slower than expected, particularly for solar thermal, and I would urge you all to embrace this scheme which is due to finish at the end of March next year,” he said.
Technologies eligible under the RHPP range from air source heat pumps and biomass boilers, to ground source heat pumps and solar water heating.
