Housing Executive: Free hot water project to help fuel poverty
April 1, 2025
Free hot water project to help with fuel poverty
BBCA new device that will heat tenants’ hot water tank for free is being piloted in some Housing Executive properties.
Michael Moore from Omagh is one of up to 20 householders taking part in the project run by the NI Housing Executive and EnergyCloud NI.
“It’s hot water all the time – and it’s very hot at times,” he said.
It is hoped that the devices, which use excess locally-generated renewable energy, will help mitigate fuel poverty. Participants have had four tankfuls of hot water in the first fortnight.
For Michael, whose adult son has had a kidney transplant, it means not having to turn on the immersion heater for hot water when the family already spends money to keep the house warm.
“You just hear it turning on. I don’t have to touch anything, it just happens automatically,” said Michael.
“You get up in the morning and the water’s hot, it’s great.”
‘The potential is huge’
When more renewable power is being produced than can be used, generators can be ordered to reduce or switch off their facilities to manage the grid.
It can happen more often at night when demand from the public is low.
With at least 22% of households in Northern Ireland in fuel poverty, where more than 10% of the household income is spent on heating, the project could have a wide-ranging impact, according to the head of sustainability at the Housing Executive.
“For us as an organisation with 82,000 houses, the potential is huge,” said Robert Clements.
“Typically, a hundred times a year, the householder will get free hot water.
“They’ll get a message the night before so they know.
“We have got a fuel poverty issue in Northern Ireland and this is a way of mitigating and reducing fuel poverty.”
Helping people and the environment
Projects to use “wasted” renewable energy began in the republic in 2023.
Almost 40% of wind energy generated in Northern Ireland in December 2024 was unused due to restrictions in the power grid.
About 915 GWh of renewable energy generated in Northern Ireland in 2024 as a whole had to be dispatched down – enough, EnergyCloud NI says, to heat more than 300 million tanks of hot water.
Redirecting surplus energy to give free hot water to households at risk of fuel poverty both improves the efficiency of renewable generation and supports vulnerable people.
“The energy that’s being used to heat these tankfuls of water during the night, that’s green energy, that’s clean energy that’s largely speaking reduced carbon content,” said Jamie Delargy, chair of EnergyCloud NI.
“So it really is helping to help people but do it in a way that helps the environment.”
Search
RECENT PRESS RELEASES
Related Post
