Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 15 June 2021
187. Deputy Eoin Ó Broin asked the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications the status of item demand generation-national retrofit; and the breakdown of the current and capital expenditure. [30829/21]
View answerThe Programme for Government and the 2019 Climate Action Plan set ambitious targets to upgrade 500,000 homes to a Building Energy Rating of B2 or cost optimal, and to install 400,000 heat pumps in existing buildings by 2030. Generating additional demand for energy upgrades will be necessary in order to achieve these targets. SEAI has conducted qualitative and quantitative research among homeowners in order to clearly identify the most important benefits and most significant challenges associated with retrofit. This research shows that we need to convince homeowners of the comfort, cost and environmental benefits of home energy upgrades. We need to inform them of the availability of grants to support their efforts as well as free services for eligible energy poor homes. Finally we need to mitigate misgivings homeowners may have about cost of works and disruption.
SEAI Home Retrofit Demand Generation activity is constantly developing with successful programme promotion and awareness building ongoing. One recent example was actively targeting Heat Pump installations following the lifting of Covid lockdown restrictions in April. SEAI are also currently preparing a comprehensive national demand generation campaign which will commence in quarter three 2021. The campaign is currently being developed and is being informed by the insights above as well as the expertise of the Authority’s behavioural economics team. SEAI will also undertake a number of community based social marketing events in various locations around the country. These are targeted marketing campaigns underpinned by theories of behaviour change.
In 2021 the budget allocation for demand generation is €1.05 million (current expenditure) with approximately 10% of budget expended to date.
