British Gas leads the way with new-for-old boilers

British Gas today announced it will match-fund the Government’s £400 boiler scrappage allowance. This means customers buying a new boiler from British Gas can cut the cost by £800 this winter.

The announcement came as British Gas welcomed the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Energy & Climate Change, Ed Miliband, to its Energy Academy in Dartford - one of five British Gas academies, which train apprentice engineers to install and maintain energy-efficient boilers.

British Gas has worked quickly to put match-funding in place following the Government’s unveiling of its new boiler scrappage scheme in the Pre-Budget Report on 9 December 2009.

British Gas is the leading installer of energy efficient boilers in Britain. Each year, the company installs 120,000 new boilers, and trains between 300 and 500 engineers who fit and maintain them - as well as many other new energy technologies, such as solar panels.

Welcoming the Prime Minister, Sam Laidlaw, Chief Executive of Centrica (the owner of British Gas), said: “If the UK is to meet its tough carbon reduction targets, it is vital that old, inefficient energy technologies are replaced. The Government’s boiler scrappage scheme is, therefore, a very welcome initiative; it will assist the replacement of the country’s four million inefficient domestic boilers with new boilers, which can improve energy efficiency by up to 30% - an important step towards lowering carbon emissions.”

Unveiling British Gas’s match-funding, Phil Bentley, Managing Director of British Gas, said: "We want to help customers take advantage of the new boiler scrappage scheme, so we’re offering to match the Government’s £400 allowance, which means customers can cut a total of £800 from the cost of a new boiler from British Gas.

“As the country’s leading installer of energy efficient boilers, we know that new boilers help lower fuel bills by as much as £235 a year.”

British Gas’s match-funding is available from tomorrow (Wednesday 6 January 2010). More information is available at: www.britishgas.co.uk/yourboiler.

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Notes to editors

The boiler scrappage scheme

* The Government will pay £400 directly to the customer when they submit proof of purchase of their new energy efficient boiler
* The scheme is available to private sector owners and landlords in England
* Only those with G-rated boilers are eligible
* The scheme opens on 6 January 2010
* The funds allocated to the scheme total £50m
* There are 125,000 vouchers available to customers via the Government’s boiler scrappage scheme

British Gas funding

* British Gas is announcing plans to match the Government’s £400 scrappage allowance for customers who replace their boilers that are G-rated or below with a new energy efficient condensing boiler
* This means that customers who use British Gas to replace their boiler will see £800 cut from the final cost
* Customers simply need to visit www.britishgas.co.uk/yourboiler or call British Gas on 0800 009 4450 to arrange for a free consultation with a heating advisor

British Gas, boilers and energy efficiency

* British Gas is the largest installer of boilers in the UK, installing around 120,000 each year
* British Gas also services four million boilers each year and has a unique understanding of the state of the nation’s boilers
* British Gas has more than 7,000 Gas Safe (formerly CORGI registered) engineers who install and maintain boilers, central heating systems - as well as new technologies, such as solar panels and ground source heat pumps
* There are more than four million inefficient boilers in use at present time in Britain
* Installing energy-efficient boilers can help customers improve their energy efficiency by up to 30%
* Customers can find out if their boiler needs to be replaced via the British Gas website: http://www.britishgas.co.uk/products-and-services/boilers/central-heating/does-your-boiler-need-replacing.html
* British Gas is the leading installer of energy-efficient condensing boilers
* British Gas is also the largest provider of household energy efficiency products in the UK; we provided more than 63 million energy efficiency products in 2008, saving around 900,000 tonnes of CO2
* Figures on the savings that can be made by installing energy-efficient boilers are available from the Energy Saving Trust: http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/

British Gas engineers and apprentices

* British Gas trains new engineers at five energy academies, which are based Leicester, Dartford, Hamilton, Leeds and Thatcham
* Each year, British Gas trains between 300 and 500 apprentice engineers

* The training sites each include a “green” training area where apprentices learn to install smart meters and the low-carbon technologies of the future, including solar panels and biomass boilers
* British Gas is the largest single trainer and employer of domestic gas engineers in the UK.
* British Gas invests £30,000 in the training of each apprentice