Question reference: S6W-00686
- Asked by: Foysol Choudhury, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
- Date lodged: 15 June 2021
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Current status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 1 July 2021
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what financial support it will offer (a) commercial and (b) domestic premises to assist with installing renewable energy systems after the Renewable Heating Incentive scheme ends in March 2022.
Answer
The Scottish Government has a number of loan schemes open to those interested in RHI which will continue to be available when the RHI ends in 2022.
They include: The Renewables Loan which supports the installation of renewables measures in Scottish domestic properties. Households can fund up to two renewables systems for each home, to a maximum of £17,500 in total and up to £6,000 funding for an energy storage system.
To help first time adopters over the first hurdle to renewables, we also have developed an additional incentive, the Renewable Heat Cashback Scheme, which can offer up to 75% (to a maximum of £7,500) cashback funding.
For commercial properties, we have the SME Loan and cashback scheme. The loan scheme provides unsecured, interest free loans of up to £100,000 to Scottish Small to Medium size enterprises, not-for-profit organisations and charities to finance the installation of renewable heating and energy efficiency measures. Since the inception of the SME loan scheme, it has paid over £29 million in loans, funding more than 1000 projects.
In October 2008, the cashback scheme was launched to stimulate uptake of the Energy Efficiency and Renewables Heat measures in non-domestic properties. SMEs can apply for a 75% cashback grant of up to £10,000 towards the cost of a renewables heating system and a further 30% cashback of up to £10,000 for energy efficiency measures.