Energy Systems Catapult published a report on 21 November 2025 setting out recommendations for the next generation of retrofit funding schemes, ahead of the government's Warm Homes Plan. The report, Heating up: Towards a new generation of warm home schemes, draws on the Catapult's policy analysis, consumer trials and business model work, including a trial delivering Warm Home Prescription through the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) with ScottishPower1.
The report's central proposal is that future schemes should be built around household needs rather than delivered nationally in isolation:
"we propose that the next generation of retrofit funding schemes should be centred around consumers' needs, delivered through area-based partnerships, and have a specific focus on the health and social outcomes associated with affordable clean heat."
Its recommendations cover three areas. National retrofit policy should be delivered locally through area-based partnerships, tied in with other local plans such as Local Area Energy Plans where possible. Schemes should improve consumer trust and ensure high-quality installations, with households given a digital building logbook recording improvements and a live Energy Performance Certificate as a single source of truth on installed low carbon technologies. Schemes should also be designed to maximise health and social outcomes, prioritising low income and vulnerable households most at risk of acute health problems from living in a cold home, and equipping health authorities with the resource and remit to identify and refer health vulnerable households to energy efficiency schemes1.
Kat Young, Practice Manager for Heat Policy at Energy Systems Catapult, said evidence from the ScottishPower trial showed the current design of ECO makes it difficult for many of those most at risk to access help. She said the latest phase of ECO ends in March 2026, which the Catapult describes as a significant opportunity to redesign the scheme. The report calls for the next version of ECO to be a long-term, 10-year programme focused on building local supply chains, improving health and social outcomes, and using local knowledge to match local priorities1.
Why it matters for households
The report concerns the design of the schemes that fund home energy improvements for low income and vulnerable households, rather than any change to what a household can currently claim. Its recommendations, if adopted, would affect how households experience those schemes: through local delivery rather than national administration, through records of work done to a home, and through referral routes from health services. For a household weighing up grants and schemes as a route to energy independence, the report's emphasis on consumer trust and installation quality addresses a common concern about retrofit work. The Catapult's own account of the ECO trial suggests that access, not just funding levels, shapes whether households at risk of cold-related ill health receive help1.
What happens next
The latest phase of ECO ends in March 2026, according to the report1. The government's Warm Homes Plan is described as upcoming, and the Catapult frames its recommendations as input to that plan. No date has been reported for publication of the Warm Homes Plan, and no government response to the report has been reported.
Sources1 cited
- Heating up: Towards a new generation of warm home schemes, es.catapult.org.uk