The Heat Pump Association (HPA) has welcomed the appointment of Theresa May as Prime Minister and the formation of the new Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Department.
HPA president, Mike Nankivell, said. “The HPA is pleased to congratulate Teresa May on her appointment as Prime Minister. Mrs May is the HPA’s local MP, as her constituency includes Hare Hatch near Reading, where we are based.
'She has always been very receptive to our communications and appeared to support strong action on climate change. In 2014, she readily agreed to be the keynote speaker at the 30th Anniversary of the Federation of Environmental Trade Associations (FETA), under whose umbrella the HPA operates.”
He continued: “The HPA has always worked closely with government departments - in particular the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) - and we were initially somewhat alarmed at the news reports that DECC would be amalgamated with another government department. We have had occasion to be concerned in the past that critical synergies on environmental matters could not be effectively achieved because of communication difficulties between the separate departments such as DECC, DCLG, DEFRA and BIS.
'With this in mind, we are of the view that the new Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Department could in fact be an extremely positive and welcome step towards greater joined up thinking on stimulating the take up of heat pumps, renewable heating and carbon reduction in general, and hence the UK can play a meaningful part in tackling climate change.”
Mr Nankivell concluded. “We look forward to forming a close working relationship with the new department and hope to arrange a meeting with the ministerial team as soon as practicable.”
Separately, BSRIA has welcomed Greg Clark, Secretary of State for the newly created ministry for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, announced by the new Prime Minister, Theresa May.
Chief executive of BSRIA Julia Evans said: “This is inspired thinking from the Prime Minister to marry the worlds of business, energy and industrial strategy. With the recent Brexit announcement and political turmoil – we need to know that there is stability ahead for, not only our members, but the industry at large. Indeed, after Brexit, Amber Rudd (when secretary of state for energy) said that there will be no changes to energy policy and we hope that there will be no changes under Dr Clark’s stewardship.”
She continued: “BSRIA was calling on government for such clarity – so this appointment goes some way to addressing this. However, there have been less than industry-friendly energy U-turns – we need to engage with Dr Clark to see what his vision for the role is. In this respect – BSRIA invites the secretary of state to work closely with industry.
Delivering the change that is required to meet the carbon emission targets will require long term investment from industry; this will only happen if it has the confidence to do so. Government needs to agree an action plan that will deliver low-carbon heat and energy efficient homes,” Ms Evans said.