News
- Published:
- 29 September 2016
Heat Trust has today launched its Heat Cost Calculator. Designed specifically for domestic customers served by new district heating schemes, the Heat Cost Calculator is a new online tool that will allow customers to compare their annual heating and hot water costs with a typical, alternative heating system.
The Calculator has been developed to help improve transparency in the sector by increasing public access to information on heating and hot water costs. Customers simply need to input their postcode, property size and annual heat and hot water use (as set out in a heat bill) to compare against a similar sized property heated with an individual gas boiler.
Work is already underway to expand the Heat Cost Calculator to provide a comparison against electric heating as well as gas heating.
Following its launch, all heat suppliers that have registered heat networks with Heat Trust will be required to inform their customers that the Heat Cost Calculator is available.
Bindi Patel, Head of Scheme for Heat Trust said:
“We are delighted to take the first step in providing a publicly available Heat Cost Calculator.
The will help provide customers on district heating networks with better information on how the cost of their heating and hot water compares to a common alternative. For the first time this Calculator helps customers better understand their district heating bills.
This is a starting point and work will soon be underway to offer a calculator based on electric heating at a future date.”
Mike Reynolds, Director of SSE Heat Networks, said:
“As a proud founding member of the Heat Trust, SSE Heat Networks welcomes the introduction of the Heat Cost Calculator. We believe that district heating has a pivotal role to play in the future energy mix – not just for decarbonisation and improving efficiency but also, and crucially, for affordability. As the sector grows rapidly and new customers connect every day to district heating networks we believe this kind of simple and accessible tool will help consumers to both scrutinise the prices they are paying, and to understand more clearly what they are buying.”
The Heat Cost Calculator can be accessed from the Heat Trust website here: www.heattrust.org/index.php/heat-cost-calculator