Small business funding has found £2 million for firms hoping to cut their energy costs, giving heating, insulation and solar power a chance to achieve what years of strategy documents could not: stopping money escaping through an obvious hole.
The funding was announced on 11 December through the Made Smarter Adoption Programme. It is intended to help small and medium sized businesses invest in technology that reduces bills. At last, the nation’s thermostats may receive supervision from somebody other than a man named Terry in a fleece.
The eligible improvements include better heating, insulation and solar panels. This could mean a shop finally stops heating the street through a vent the size of a portcullis, although the street has reportedly grown attached to the arrangement.
The announcement cites a Willow Review finding that 67% of SMEs adopting sustainable practices, such as installing solar panels or selling energy back to the grid, reported reduced operating costs. This has shocked only the people who have spent ten winters insisting that a draught is good air circulation.
At the Office of Productive Cosiness, grant officer Moira Radiator said the scheme supported practical investment. “A business can now replace the boiler that has spent fourteen years making a noise like a distressed trombone,” she said, while the boiler applied for heritage status.
The government presents the money as support for growth, sustainability and the wider transition to net zero. Fair enough. A lower bill gives a small firm more room to hire, invest or buy a chair that does not squeak during client calls. Economic renewal begins with fewer apologetic noises on Zoom.
The wider plan concerns the UK’s 5.7 million small and medium sized businesses. That is a lot of owners doing accounts at a kitchen table while wondering whether the warehouse roof counts as a personality test. Energy adviser Colin Kilowatt welcomed the measure because nobody opens a bottle of prosecco for loft insulation, yet the insulation remains after the prosecco has filed for expenses.
The funding will not solve every pressure on a small business. It can, however, address one with the unusual virtue of being visible. Energy efficiency delivers savings by doing something rare in public policy: it stops heat leaving through the obvious hole.
A solar panel does not promise transformation in a slide deck. It sits on a roof and gets on with it. The nation could learn from this. The panel has declined an invitation to join a steering group, requested no stakeholder map and already has a more convincing five year plan than the boiler.
Source: Department for Business and Trade.
