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Gas boiler manufacturers might hike prices to cover heat pump targets, says a report. If they do, they could rake in over £100 million extra, but customers may feel the pinch.
A recent report suggests that gas boiler makers are in a bit of a bind. They have to meet certain targets for selling heat pumps, or else face hefty penalties. To cover these penalties, they’re thinking of raising the prices of their boilers. If they go through with it, they could make a huge sum of money, over £100 million!
The Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) found that top boiler makers could pocket almost £100 million through raising gas boiler costs by £110 per boiler. They say this is because of possible fines for not selling enough heat pumps, as required by the Clean Heat Market Mechanism (CHMM), which starts April 1st.
The CHMM tells boiler makers to sell more heat pumps alongside gas boilers. In the next year, they have to sell about 50,000 heat pumps, but that’s much less than the 1.8 million gas boilers they sell each year.
The idea behind the CHMM is to encourage people to use heat pumps and make them popular. But the analysis says boiler companies might use this as a chance to make more money by raising prices, calling it a “boiler tax.”
Image Source: Business Green
Jess Ralston, an Energy Analyst at ECIU, said, “If we want to rely less on gas from other countries, we need to use more heat pumps. Heat pumps can work on renewable energy made right here in the UK. If we don’t push heat pumps, we might end up relying too much on foreign gas, and that could make our bills go up. Gas prices can be unpredictable, and they might stay high even though we’ve had two years of pricey energy bills.”
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