Bristol residents praise warmer homes scheme for transforming their houses

374 homes across the city are warmer and cheaper to run thanks to the Home Upgrade Grant

Bristol is home to around 483,000 residents, with thousands more moving to the area year-on-year. 

However, complex and dated houses across the city mean that it can be difficult and expensive for residents across the city to stay warm in the colder winter months.

Fortunately, this is no longer the case for long-time Bristol residents Gillian and Harriet, who received upgrades to their respective homes thanks to funding through the government’s Home Upgrade Grant Phase 2.

We were in Bristol to speak with Gillian and Harriet, who both praised the work for being “transformational” and completely changing the comfort of their homes.

The visit was hosted Bristol City Leap, set up as a 20-year partnership between the local council and Ameresco to accelerate decarbonisation and green energy projects across the city.

Rob Redshaw, project manager at Bristol City Leap, said: “For Bristol, the Home Upgrade Grant was a consortium delivery programme working with Bristol City Council, North Somerset Council and Bath and North East Somerset Council areas.

“The scheme looked at low income, inefficient housing and to try and bring them up to modern standards and decarbonise as much as possible.”

Gillian lives in a 300-year-old cottage in the Lamb Hill. She’s lived in the property for 44 years and it’s where she raised her three children during their adolescent years and where her three grandchildren now come to visit.

Prior to upgrades through the scheme, she had to lug bags of coal up and down a steep slope to her property to power the boiler that provided her with heating.

Harriet has lived in her post-war build, end-terrace property in Selby for half a century. 

Her home was previously warmed with three storage heaters, two of which were either broken or faulty. 

Thanks to upgrades funded through the scheme, both women heat their homes with air source heat pumps. 

Additionally, they’ve had solar panels fit to their roofs, loft insulation and additional ventilation measures installed. 

On sunny days her daily cost of electricity can be as low as £1. 

Rob added: “It was amazing to see the impacts and to hear it direct from them, to hear about how it’s made a difference to their lives and how it’s benefited them over the last year. 

“At the end of the day, that’s the reason that we do what we do – that’s the reason these funding programmes exist. 

“It’s an incredible story to hear and to see the difference that we can make with this funding and these types of programmes.”

Watch our shirt video with Rob to learn more about Bristol City Leap’s ambitions to decarbonise the city and why work like this is important for the people of Bristol.

Visitors on the day included our chief executive Kevin Holland who praised Bristol City Leap for its dedication to deliver decarbonisation works with residents placed at the heart.

Kevin said: “What’s nice about going to see the houses that are transformed through the programmes is that they change from being houses which are projects, which we see all day, every day with solar air source heat pumps and all the technicalities, but we’re going into people’s homes and we can really see the impact on people’s lives of the kind of changes you can do with these programmes.

“The programmes bring many benefits, they decarbonise, but they also create warm, lovely homes for people to live in.”

Watch our short video with chief executive Kevin to hear more about the visit and the anecdotal feedback we received from Gillian and Harriet.

Looking ahead, Bristol City Leap is looking to accelerate its decarbonisation plans to benefit more people across the city. 

Rob added: “374 is a good step, but there’s hundreds of thousands of homes across the country that are going to need upgraded.”

Thank you to Bristol City Leap for hosting us on this visit and particularly to Gillian and Harriet for sharing their experiences with the scheme. 

About the Home Upgrade Grant Phase 2

• funding for the scheme is provided on behalf of the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero 
• the Home Upgrade Grant aimed to provide energy efficiency upgrades and low carbon heating via local authority funding, to households in England that are low income, off the gas grid or have an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) between D and G
• funding is exclusively reserved for off-gas grid homes
• you can read more about the scheme via our website