'Slow but encouraging' start for Green Deal

There have been over 1,800 Green Deal assessments so far in the first months of the scheme, according to official statistics published today.

According to figures published by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) since the Green Deal launched in January that have been 1,803 Green Deal assessments.

The figures show that 1,729 Green Deal assessments were conducted in February, the first full month of the scheme being in operation, with the remainder carried out in January.

Customers wishing to get a Green Deal must first go through the assessment, which can cost around £100, before getting work done to their property. But not all assessments will result in customers taking up the Green Deal and having work done to their properties.

No statistics are yet available for how many properties have actually received Green Deals.

The figures from DECC also show that £26.9m of contracts for work under the Energy Company Obligation (ECO), the Green Deal’s sister scheme, have been let in the first two months of 2013.

Energy secretary Ed Davey said the figures were a “clear signs of a promising new market” and “showed genuine interest from consumer”. “This underlines that the Green Deal is very much up and running,” he said.

Russell Smith, managing director of retrofit consultant Parity Projects, said it was “slow but encouraging” start to the scheme. “It was always going to be a slow start. If the government had launched it in October last year it would have been slow,” he said.

John Alker, director of policy at the UK Green Building Council, said it was great to see the “momentum building” behind the Green Deal and ECO.

“While much of this activity will have been driven by DECC-funded local authority projects, it still demonstrates that the public are taking note of the scheme and getting involved.

“However, the initial rush provided by these early projects, and the subsequent take-up driven by the cash-back scheme is likely to prove unsustainable in the long-term if government fails to put in place lasting, structural incentives. We would hope to see proposals in this respect included in next week’s budget.”

Matthew Rhodes, director at sustainability consultant Encraft, said the figures were “distorted” by government schemes - such as its Pioneer Places programme - to kick-start Green Deal roll out in some areas.

“These figures have effectively been paid for directly by central government so are not yet indicative of the true market reaction,” he said.

Andrew Warren, director of the Association for the Conservation of Energy, said he found it difficult to be “enthused” by only one completed month of figures.

“If the figure stayed as low as that for years it would be discouraging but there’s no reason why it would,” he said.

Warren added that it was more important to get the “infrastructure” of the scheme in place at this point and DECC figures showing the number of Green Deal providers had reached 40 in February was a good sign.

Sustainability expert Neil Cutland said it was an “encouraging picture”.

He added: “It shows that real activity is going on, and hopefully that the fears of major job losses thanks to a hiatus are unfounded. I’m particularly excited to see that ECO brokerage is up and running, and that significant volumes are being traded already.”