Current status: Answered by Patrick Harvie on 4 May 2023
To ask the Scottish Government how the new National Public Energy Agency will work with local government on area-based delivery.
The new National Public Energy Agency – Heat and Energy Efficiency Scotland (HEES) –which is operating in virtual form in-house within the Directorate for Energy and Climate Change aims to work in partnership with a range of key stakeholders, including local government, to provide strategic leadership and co-ordination to accelerate both the pace and scale of heat and energy retrofit across domestic, non-domestic and public sector buildings in Scotland. To support this aim, one of the roles of the Agency will be to improve overall coordination including how it can most effectively work with local government.
COSLA are represented on the HEES independent Strategic Board which has been established to provide support to the design of the future Agency and also more widely on how the virtual Agency can accelerate the roll out of zero emissions heating and evolve our delivery approaches.
The virtual Agency continues to have ongoing engagement with COSLA and local authorities on specific delivery programmes. Since 2013 the Area Based Schemes funded by the Scottish Government and delivered by local councils have helped over 100,000 fuel poor households to benefit from warmer homes and lower energy bills. We have allocated £64 million for energy efficiency improvements through these schemes this year and continue to build upon our partnership approach to delivery.