In the Government’s increasingly farcical heat pump strategy, from next year manufacturers will be fined up to £5,000 for every heat pump they fail to sell below their quota. Matthew Lynn in the Telegraph has more (warning: Lynn assumes Net Zero is necessary to “combat climate change”).
Over the last week, the Government has finally started to straighten out its ‘Net Zero’ policy, dropping some of the crazier targets, and coming into line with most of Europe and North America. In hindsight, it was always too good to last. The Government has just updated its “strategy” on heat pumps – and even amid stiff competition it is one of its battiest yet.
Replacing traditional oil and gas boilers with heat pumps that run on electricity will play a role in combating climate change. No one disputes that. Home heating accounts for around 14% of the U.K.’s total carbon emissions and unless that comes down it will be very hard to get to Net Zero.
The trouble is that very few people want to make the switch. Even though the Government will soon be offering grants as high as £7,500 per home, heat pumps remain unpopular and take-up is running way below schedule.
So, like a Soviet commissar after a couple of vodkas too many, the Government has just set a target instead. From next year, manufacturers will be told how many heat pumps they have to shift, based on the number of gas boilers they sell, and will face fines of up to £5,000 for every unit they fall short by.
Seriously? It is hard to know where this new wheeze of fining companies for not selling enough of Government approved products might end. Wetherspoons could have an orange juice quota, with swingeing penalties if someone buys a pint of Stella instead. And we could nab a few million from Gregg’s if sales of climate friendly vegan sausage rolls fail to match the high-pollution pork-based variety.
Worth reading in full.
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Oh but Rishi told us he was delaying the rollout for another 5 years. I wonder who is telling the porky pies?
I did point out at the time of Fishy’s ‘rollback,’ which many were applauding, that he had done no such thing, he was simply moving things around.
The comparison with the Soviet state could not be more apt. What will happen of course is that boiler manufacturers will simply spread the burden of fines on to the cost of each boiler they sell – understandably.
I am absolutely staggered that in 2023 we have reached the point where government sees fit to interfere in the lives of its citizens in such an egregious manner.
Yes, I know what’s going on but this hurts now.
Whatever it is now / next I will NOT comply.
Good one, HP. Agree 100%
Thanks Aethelred
RESIST DEFY DO NOT COMPLY!!!
I will not have a heat pump under any circumstances. That used to be because it would not work in my 1970s poorly built, poorly insulated and quite draughty bungalow. Like all of these issues (covid, net zero, immigration, LGBTQALPHABETSOUP, Ukraine) the government have succeeded in radicalising me and now my objections have hardened to being ideological.
Edit: They will have to prise my high efficiency, low maintenance, compact, trouble free, fast reacting, easily programmed oil fired central heating boiler from my cold, dead fingers.
What will happen is that once enough people have heat pumps installed, the government will state that the gas network/oil deliveries will be turned off in X years. You will have the choice of a heat pump or no heat. No consumers will go to prison. They might die of cold regardless.
Politicians are all about balancing gesture politics (on “climate” in this case) with practical politics. Ultimately the ‘transition’ to heat pumps will only be completed at a pace that is politically feasible.
Similarly, once the infrastructure for electric cars is in place, and enough people have them, they will close petrol stations down. If you still have a petrol car at that point their might be a scrappage scheme of some sort.
Of course, we are all the poorer for government meddling, and the abandonment of the best source of energy; fossil fuels, so the above may be cold comfort.
I fear you are absolutely right it is not Net Zero but complete zero with nothing at all.
As the infrastructure will never be in place because it’s both practically unachievable I am hopeful that the Net Zero project will die a death sooner rather than later.
“Under any circumstances”???——Yes I know what you mean and I say the same about smart meters etc, but with all things green, first comes the nudge and then comes the push. Are you aware that there are proposals to jail people for a year or fine them 15,000 quid if they refuse to allow a smart meter or install a heat pump? ——-First they get all the low hanging fruit, but they will be coming for you and I eventually. Net Zero is enshrined in law mate. They have you by the balls.
Yes, I still manage to keep up to date with developments most the time. I’ll go to jail first, if they are able to get me out of my house.
There simply wouldn’t be enough prison room, would there? The proposed system is totally unworkable.
They’ll fine you and when you don’t or can’t pay the fine they’ll seize your property.
Prison will be reserved for the leaders of any organised opposition.
I honestly think that if that set of circumstances came to pass there would be civil war in this country.
Let’s hope so
I am not sure about civil war. A civil war would turn neighbours against neighbours and I see little value in that for the citizenry. The most inspiring outcome would be mass insurrection. Running some local councillors and officials out of town would be great fun before moving on to the Khant’s Londonistan and treating him to some Anglo Saxon justice and then moving on to Westminster to round up those still troughing at the cheap bars and restaurants, Fishy and his goons having long skedaddled.
Yeah, I suppose that’s really what I was thinking – string up a few pour encourager les autres!
It doesn’t have to be a heat pump. It could be ordinary electric heating or storage heaters. I absolutely definitely will not be having a heat pump.
Your being pedantic. I know there are more ways to heat a house than a heat pump.(but not many) But it is the direction of travel I am talking about. We are having energy that works and is affordable removed and replaced with unaffordable energy that doesn’t work. The idea that government are even proposing to fine people or jail them really shows the true totalitarian nature of this pretend to save the planet stuff. We can all say “I will never have a heat pump” etc , but as with smart meters which are currently not compulsory, the government will change the law to force us to have them.
They will have to heat the jails sufficiently to avoid “human rights” issues. It might be the best option for cash-strapped pensioners – three meals a day too!
They haven’t got enough prison guards to send everyone who doesn’t comply to jail. Nope. We have a duty to not comply with bad laws. Complying means we recognise and acknowledge they have the power and that the law is OK, reasonable, fine. It isn’t. They might have it enshrined in law but it’s a law based on a Jenga tower of lies and half-baked science. Once you get your trial date, you demand a trial by jury. Juries are obliged to not make decisions based on bad laws. Yes, of course they can try and pressure the jury, but they can’t pressure them all. Either way, we have a duty to civilly disobey.
Points that doubtless will require repeating over the coming months Aethelred
I agree with you, there are not enough prison place, but your missing the point. The intention is there in the New Energy Bill to give jail time or a fine of 15,000 quid. The whole climate charade is a pack of lies, I know that. I have been commenting on this issue on various platforms since about 2007.Now you and I might resist getting a heat pump or a smart meter till they break our front door in, but many people will not do that. They might not be able to terrorise you but the general public are not so aware of the extent of this eco socialist scam and the threat of a fine will likely make them submit.
Love the alphabetsoup. No way am I getting a heat pump either, they can shove it! Those who live in little back-to-back terrace houses, or flats / apartments – where are they supposed to fit the monstrosities? It’s another idiotic idea supported by the blood-sucking idiots and miscreants who inhabit the chambers of Westminster and such palaces.
Governments have worked out that while many individuals may resist and stand up to their orders, companies for the most part are far less rebellious. And so they’ve taken on this approach where companies are the enforcers of government policies, whether they want to be or not.
Stakeholders. ———————In Tyranny
As Benito Mussolini once said: “Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power” and “Fascism denies that the majority, by the simple fact that it is a majority, can direct human society.”
With the passing of the so-called Online Harms Bill, the proposed NetZero enforcement laws, the coming biometric information passports, WHO Pandemic Treaty, the actions of Dinenage etc can we really be in any doubt as to the direction we are heading or indeed, have actually already arrived at?
So the manufacturers will go bust, and no one will be able to buy either a heat pump or a gas boiler? Good plan.
Or go somewhere else where the cost of doing business is lower, and they can make a decent return on their investment.
I will NEVER stop telling people about what the absurd Grant Schapps said when asked on GB News if Heat Pumps are any good, only about 6 weeks ago. He said “I don’t know, but I am having one fitted in my house soon so I shall find out” ———–WHAT? —– He doesn’t know? But as Energy Security and Net Zero Minister he would force one down all of our throats and rip out our gas, which is the best heating system we ever had. —-I see this blithering idiot has now moved to the Ministry of Defence. I wonder if he knows if tanks and guns are any good or is he likely just to be as dumb in his new job as he was in his last one?
They are all blithering idiots. Past a certain level of complexity we all are, a level of complexity that modern society exceeds by a huge margin.
Most of us though try not too put our idiocy on display too much, unlike that moron, who is signalling to entire world how he will gladly sell his grandmother to advance his career.
The more they trespass into our daily lives, the more apparent their stupidity becomes. To everyone but them. It is very unnerving.
The man is the living epitome of a Useful Idiot. Parliament is stuffed with them.
https://www.heraldscotland.com/business_hq/19667912.window-rattling-air-pumps-not-scotlands-answer-net-zero/
They’re completely unsuitable in our damp, windy climate, says Lord Haughey, owner of Heat Pump company…but Wishy Washy Sunak isn’t listening.
Look how long it has taken to get smart meters everywhere, and that is just a little box. Imagine the almighty clutter of ripping out gas central heating, pipes below floors, and radiators and then redecorating all the mess and putting new flooring and carpets back. ——This is absurd, but then so is the whole climate farce. And it will cost us all a tidy sum just to end up colder, and remember cold causes way more deaths than heat ever did which actually means we are all going to be signing our own death certificate and paying 20 grand to do so.
I’m assuming the companies willing to go over to just heat pumps will simply stop producing gas boilers. Similarly with the smart meters: while there’s no current legal requirement to have one fitted, Section 88 of the Energy Act 2008 will require suppliers to install smart meters in order to supply: no meter, no supply. This backdoor tyranny has been in the works for a very long time. Evil beyond words.
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2008/32/section/88
It’s the same with the attitude towards cars etc. Every time a car has a minor scrape, it is deemed beyond repair and scrapped. There are also schemes to hand in your old car and get money off a new compliant one. Slowly, bit by bit, they squeeze the car market dry. The same will probably be applied to gas boilers. Spares will become difficult to find and boiler technicians will be thin on the ground and being able to comply with onerous regulations will get harder. All in all, the term for this is ‘boiling the frogs’. We have to act now really but I get a feeling there are not enough of us who actually realise these things and want to do something about it.
There are most certainly “not enough of us”. Have you ever tried to discuss this issue in amongst family or friends? What was the result? Did you find that they mostly stared at you like you are from Mars? Propaganda is a very powerful tool, and on the issue of energy and climate the propaganda is relentless from UN Podiums and Conferences, to our own lacky politicians, to Liberal mainstream media. ordinary people busy with work and family life don’t have the time to investigate every issue and they tend to rely on the 6 O’oclock News. —-That is what you are up against.
I thought that nice Rishi Sunak was adopting a sensible, rational approach to net zero? Except you can’t implement a certifiably insane policy in a sensible, rational way. And this a Tory party packed to the gunwhales with net zero fanatics- ‘blubber’ Sharma, new Guardian columnist Chris Skidmore, May, Goldsmith, Baillie, Saxby, Shapps (for today, anyway)…”Labour would be worse” not much of a selling point if electoral choice is freeze/starve today or freeze/starve tomorrow. And as I’ll keep on saying, the option of using the ballot box to effect change expired many years ago.
This is Totalitarianism and our Government are acting like the Chinese . Government and have no business in commerce . They should be taken to law .
“Replacing traditional oil and gas boilers with heat pumps that run on electricity will play a role in combating climate change. No one disputes that.” Really Mr Lynn? What about the over 1,700 scientists and professionals, including at least one Nobel Prize winner, who signed the CLINTEL declaration: Climate Intelligence (CLINTEL) climate change and climate policy? This has nothing to do with the environment, or even about reducing carbon dioxide emissions, and everything to do with trying to implement a Soviet / CCP-style centrally-planned economy in a desperate attempt to cling to power whilst the debt-based, fiat monetary system collapses after decades of fraud and mismanagement.
All the boiler manufacturers will have to sell heat pumps. None can afford the £5000 fine per boiler sold. So the number of boilers they can sell will be limited by the number of heat pumps they have managed to sell. Considering very few people want a heat pump there will be a massive shortage of gas boilers available and manufacturers will be able to name their price. It is another intentional and unnecessary attack on working class finances, just the same as limiting the sale of ICE cars to 20% by 2030. If you think that you might need a new boiler soon, buy it now!
Incidentally many old and inefficient boilers will be getting repaired well after they should have been scrapped and replaced.
There is no Climate Emergency.
”A man walks down the street
It’s a street in a strange world
Maybe it’s the third world”
Or maybe its the UK when all these boiler and car policies have reduced the UK to a post apocalyptic immiserated nation of desperation, a bit like those scenes from those old films about life after a nuclear war. As the boiler industry and the car industry go down the tubes it is hard not to feel that they will drag much of the rest of the UK economy with them.
I sometimes think the UK economy and social structure is a lot more fragile than people imagine, these mad eco policies might be enough to sink us.
“these mad eco policies might be enough to sink us.”
Not quite. These mad eco policies are intended to sink us utterly and completely.
The Davos Deviants have a whole new world mapped out for themselves and any slaves they require. Their visions really are based on the wildest of science fiction fantasies and that is where we are headed unless we turn to violence because peaceful means will not stop them.
As I posted a day or so ago we are fast approaching the Death or Glory point – us or them.
The stage after that is MAD MAX
It depends on the fine. Some producers might find it cheaper to pay the fine. Will annualised s les be used as the basis for determining the ratio? If so, businesses will just take orders and string out installation.
I perceive a Black market in the making.
These dopes imagine we are all blocks of wood with no independent agency.
It occurs to me that air conditioning units are heat pumps in reverse. Shall we ban them?
Climate change? Why don’t these people look outside and see nothing has changed. The Emperor is still naked. As with the scamdemic all people had to do was look out of their windows and discover there were no bodies lining the streets and no one shouting “bring it your dead bring out your dead”. Zombies all of them.
Heat Pumps are proof that we haven’t progressed much since the neolithic period. The government will be ignored as usual.
I am still wondering how the Government will explain the inevitable power cuts when electricity demand exceeds the available supply. We are regularly very close to that point at the moment, and 10s of thousands of heat pumps will take us over the edge, very likely this winter. I can imagine the BBC telling everyone to turn off most appliances, and stop charging their cars as the obvious response. We are now so tired of the lies that I will deliberately use as much power as possible, this kind of killing of our Country has to stop immediately, and there will be severe riots on cut number one. Our coal powered power stations (sadly only 2 left) are still making a lot of money on the back of the very variable weather!
Here is an example of the lies we were told, and this is very, very serious.
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/mrna-vaccines-must-be-banned-once-and-for-all/
You can see that they have tried to kill us with bioweapons, now they are trying cold.
Given the fact that not only do we not have the electricity available to run heat pumps, charge electric cars, keep the lights on, there are not enough installers to convert all UK homes in the proposed timescale, it will take almost 400 years..I don’t think I’ll make it!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-66359093