Energy Saving Trust To Get Tough On Leaky Home Landlords

[cashinmattress]

Energy Saving Trust to get tough on leaky home landlords

Advisory body suggests draconian new measures as part of crack down on homes with F and G energy efficiency ratings

The government advisory body responsible for domestic energy saving has signalled that it is willing to get tough on homeowners and landlords that fail to improve the efficiency of the most energy profligate buildings.

From next week the Energy Saving Trust will be given the power to contact anyone moving into a home with the lowest F or G energy ratings and provide them with information on how they could improve their building and realise savings on their energy bills. The move is a part of efforts to meet government targets to cut domestic carbon emissions 29 per cent by 2020

A representative for the organisation said that the move was likely to be the first step in a push to effectively eradicate the most inefficient homes.

"We would like to see the authorities use environmental health regulations to tackle the really badly insulated homes," she said.

Her comments echo those of the Trust's director of strategy Marian Spain, who in an interview with The Times raised the prospect of legislation that would effectively block homeowners and landlord from selling or letting homes with F or G ratings until they have invested in improving their energy efficiency.

"We need a powerful incentive to act as a backstop in case other measures do not work," she said. "To sell your home you would need to have done the basics to take it out of the F and G ratings. The final deadline should be 2015."

Such draconian measures may be required to encourage property owners to invest the £5,000 to £10,000 it is estimated to cost to upgrade the most inefficient homes to at least an E rating.

However, Spain said that anyone investing in energy efficiency was likely to get the money back in the form of lower energy bills and higher property prices.

The spokeswoman for the Trust said that targeting the 5.5 million homes in the two lowest bands could deliver massive energy and carbon savings at a relatively low cost.

"Our figures show that if all the F and G homes were upgraded to just meet Band E standards we would save 9.4 million tonnes of carbon emissions a year," she said. "That is equivalent to the emissions from lighting, heating and electrical appliances generated in total by Manchester, Belfast, Liverpool, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh and Glasgow."

Under the guise of 'carbon savings', landlords, especially the slummy ones, get hammered.

Meh.