Government awards £778m for decarbonisation work on 90,000 homes

Clarion took the largest share of the funding with a £49m bid, with Nottingham City Council a close second with £47.2m.

Other large allocations included the Greater Manchester Combined Authority, which received £37m; Tees Valley Combined Authority, which received £32.4m; the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, which received £31m; and Sanctuary Housing Association, which received £40.4m.

The Sanctuary bid represents a consortium, the Greener Futures Partnership, which also includes Anchor, Abri, Home Group and Hyde Group. The partners will use the cash to retrofit 5,000 social homes.

The first wave of SHDF funding was allocated in February last year, with 69 projects awarded a share of £179m. 

It was to go towards upgrading the energy efficiency of roughly 20,000 social housing properties that have an EPC rating below C by March 2023.

However, deadlines for the first wave were extended in February, after data revealed that just over 7% of the expected energy performance improvements had been completed so far.

A further £409m was awarded through the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme to reduce the carbon emissions of hospitals, schools, museums, universities and other public sector buildings.

DESNZ said the £1.8bn in total funding is expected to support 20,000 jobs in the construction and home retrofit sectors.

The department also provided a breakdown of regional funding, with the South East receiving the most SHDF funding with £128.9m awarded.

Clarion, the UK’s largest housing association, will upgrade more than 6,000 homes as part of a consortium bid, it said. 

The 125,000-home landlord, which owns 5,300 of the homes, also submitted the bid on behalf of Accent Housing, Worthing Homes, Southdown Housing and BHT Sussex. 

The total project cost exceeds £100m, including £60m from Clarion’s subsidy. 

The funding will go towards a range of energy efficiency measures including cavity wall, loft and external wall insulation, improved ventilation and the installation of air source heat pumps.

Clare Miller, chief executive of Clarion, said the funding will enable the landlord to “further reduce our carbon footprint and upgrade thousands more hard-to-heat Clarion homes across the country”.

“We share government’s ambition to retrofit homes at scale right across the country and we are making giant strides in decarbonising our portfolio, both through our own asset management programme and partnerships such as the SHDF.

“We are looking forward to working with our Wave 2.1 partners to make an additional 5,300 Clarion homes warmer, more efficient and cheaper to run at a time of significant energy price growth,” she added.

Rose Bean, chair of the Greener Futures Partnership Executive Committee, said: “We’re delighted to get this over the line. We’ve worked extremely hard to ensure our bid was deliverable, cost effective and above all, brings significant benefit to our customers.

“Our main aims are to have an agreed and tested approach to delivering sustainable housing, use our strong partnership to procure services, build skills and capacity in the sector, improve energy efficiency and create healthier homes. This project will allow us to meet all of these.”

The Greener Futures Partnership’s work to the 5,000 homes will include the installation of external wall insulation, cavity wall and loft insulation top-ups, new energy-efficient double-glazing, and front and rear door replacements.

In addition, some homes will have existing heating and hot water systems replaced with technology such as air source heat pumps, and solar PV with battery storage.

Monitoring equipment will also be fitted to a number of different property types, to help measure how successful the retrofit works have been in terms of reducing carbon and increasing thermal performance.

Energy security secretary Grant Shapps said: “We know this is a difficult time for families, which is why the government has covered around half a typical household’s energy bill this winter. 

“This is a huge investment that will help households save hundreds on energy bills and see them heat their homes for less, and stay warm for longer. 

“Not only this but the funding is also a huge boost for job creation and economic growth, opening up new and exciting opportunities across the UK’s ever-expanding green sector.” 

Lord Callanan, minister for energy efficiency and green finance, said that “reaching net zero means considerable action from the public sector as well as private sector”. 

Tracy Harrison, chief executive of the Northern Housing Consortium, said the latest wave of funding “adds to the momentum already built around green home upgrades in the North”.

“We were delighted to see even more ambitious partnership bids submitted to this wave – an approach which we hope to see followed through in delivery. 

“But most importantly, these successful projects will help create warmer homes and improve the physical and mental health of people in our communities,” she said.