£10m boiler scrappage scheme for London businesses

The Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has launched a new £10 million boiler scrappage scheme that will help small businesses save money on their energy bills, as well as helping to improve the capital’s air quality.

Amid the current hot weather, the first-of-its-kind Cleaner Heat Cashback scheme will provide between 30 to 40 per cent cashback to small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) when they replace older, polluting boilers, with new, cleaner heating systems. It is hoped that it will help to make London’s workplaces more energy efficient and cut the capital’s carbon emissions, and also fulfil the Mayor’s ambition to make London a zero-carbon city by 2050.

Commercial gas consumption is currently responsible for seven per cent of London’s NOx emissions, but this proportion will increase. The Cleaner Heat Cashback scheme is part of a wider £34 million Energy for Londoners programme which aims to make London’s homes warm, healthy and affordable, its workplaces more energy efficient, and to supply the capital with more local, clean energy.

Shirley Rodrigues, Deputy Mayor for Environment & Energy, said: “There are thousands of small businesses in London who have older boilers and this hugely innovative scheme not only helps them to save money, but it also reduces carbon emissions and improves the capital’s air quality.

“Businesses could save hundreds of pounds a year on energy bills by switching from an older, inefficient boiler or heating system – and this is exactly the kind of initiative that will help us achieve the Mayor’s ambition of making London a zero-carbon city by 2050. Tackling London’s filthy air is one of the Mayor’s top priorities and this is just the latest in a package of measures that he has introduced to improve the quality of the air we breathe.”