The Swaffham Prior village heat pump scheme, which cost £ 250,000 per house

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Is there a more reliable way for the government to waste our money than for green energy schemes?

A new report by the Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is harsh on the Green Homes grant scheme, which is expected to transform 600,000 homes with insulation and greener heating systems, but was abandoned earlier this year after just six months of operation.

Only 47,500 homes received the grant, and in the end it cost taxpayers more than £ 1,000 per property in administrative fees.

The PAC said the scheme did not take into account the shortage of artisans who could do the work it was supposed to fund.

Why does it always end that way? David Cameron’s Green Deal was almost the same.

The National Audit Office, which was set up in 2013 to reduce carbon emissions by offering home insulation loans, found that it had saved “negligible amounts of CO2” until it closed two years later.

Swaffham Prior is the last village to test the new green scheme using a municipal heat pump

Today, I can unveil a green energy project that looks like an even bigger turkey.

Near the town where I live in Cambridgeshire, the county council has donated £ 12 million – including a government grant of £ 3.2 million – to a community heating system powered by a ground source heat pump (which transfers heat to / from the ground) .

This is supposed to be a test site for how all real estate can be heated in the future. By the end of December, only 47 homes had registered.

So if there is no rush of interest at the last minute, it will end up costing more than £ 250,000 per house.

That’s as much as some houses in Swaffham Prior village are worth.

But the ministers intend to force us all into similar schemes. You may have already heard that the government is proposing a ban on the installation of new gas boilers from 2035.

Pictured: How the Swaffham Prior municipal heat pump project will work

Pictured: How the Swaffham Prior municipal heat pump project will work

Much less is known that the end of oil and liquefied petroleum gas boilers used by four million homes beyond the pipeline will come sooner.

Under the heating and buildings strategy, new installations of these boilers will be banned from 2026 as part of efforts to align with the government’s legally binding goal of eliminating net carbon emissions by 2050.

So if my oil boiler fails in five years, I won’t be allowed to replace it with another one.

Will I have to find space for a large biomass boiler – burning wood pellets – or install an electric pump. This draws heat either from the air outside your home or the ground under your garden.

But heat pumps are very expensive – they cost an average of £ 12,000, costing three times as much as an oil-fired boiler. In addition, they cost more for their operation and, according to some, do not heat enough homes.

Therefore, the government wants to explore alternatives such as heating homes with a communal pump, taking advantage of economies of scale.

The scheme in Swaffham Prior is supposed to be a test bed of how all properties can be heated in the future.  By the end of December, only 47 homes had registered

The scheme in Swaffham Prior is supposed to be a test bed of how all properties can be heated in the future. By the end of December, only 47 homes had registered

The Swaffham pre-heating network should therefore correspond to the bill. The plan is to lay pipes under the field at the edge of the village, pump heat from the ground and with it pump hot water to the existing radiators of the residents.

When the water starts to flow next March, it is expected to be 72 degrees Celsius on cold winter days and a little colder in summer when it will only be used for baths or showers.

Many homes in Copenhagen, for example, are heated by a municipal system that pumps water around the city. Nottingham also has a county scheme that uses heat generated in a waste incinerator to pump hot water into 5,000 homes.

But where has economies of scale gone in the case of Swaffham Prior?

The most absurd thing about the scheme is that even if all 300 homes in the village were registered, it would still cost £ 40,000 per property.

This is almost four times as much as the installation of a heat pump would cost each resident. How the hell did anyone think that spending £ 12 million to heat just 300 homes was worth the money?

True, pioneering schemes always cost more before prices start to fall. But this is not even remotely accessible.

This is so typical of what is happening with climate change policy – every financial sense goes through the window.

In a panicked attempt by the government to achieve zero net emissions by 2050, it will throw money at everyone.

As a result, many residents were hesitant to apply for the scheme, there is a clause in the contract that says it can be terminated with a two-year notice period if it proves not feasible. Which would leave you without heating at all.

We all want clean energy. The truth is, however, that there is no such form of heating on the market that could almost compete with oil and gas.

According to the government, the UK already has 2.4 million households living in “fuel poverty”. If technology does not change quickly, this will increase when oil and gas central heating is banned.

If it’s a Swaffham Prior project, we’d need the millionaire’s deep pockets before we could consider joining an unsubsidized district heating scheme.

The Denial by Ross Clark was published by Lume Books.

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