Thousands of Welsh households still heating their homes with oil are being offered £9,000 to switch to a heat pump, the UK government has announced.
From 21 July, the government said, the Boiler Upgrade Scheme grant will rise by £1,500 — from £7,500 to £9,000 — specifically for households swapping an oil boiler for a heat pump.
The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero said leaflets explaining how to claim would land on the doormats of around 10,000 eligible Welsh homes this week.
It is aimed at rural households off the gas grid — common across Carmarthenshire, Gower and rural Pembrokeshire — who have no mains gas and have been left exposed to sharp swings in the price of heating oil.
That pressure is something this site has reported on repeatedly. Earlier this year, oil thieves were targeting Welsh homes as prices climbed, and a Llanelli haulier said the fuel crisis was adding £64,000 a week to its costs.
The government said the bigger grant would shield families from fossil fuel price spikes and give them more certainty over their bills.
Minister for Energy Consumers Martin McCluskey said the government was determined to bring bills down, but acknowledged that “the war in the Middle East has hit households on heating oil especially hard.”
He said the scheme would help thousands of families in Wales “switch to clean heat to protect them from volatile fossil fuels.”
Secretary of State for Wales Jo Stevens said Wales had a high number of households relying on heating oil, many of them “feeling the pressure of rising bills caused by global fossil fuel price spikes.”
She said the grant would be available to households across Wales and would help make energy “cleaner and more secure, while also protecting people’s pockets.”
Not everyone is convinced it goes far enough. Matt Copeland, head of policy at the charity National Energy Action, welcomed the move but warned that many families were still bracing to ration their heating this winter.
“The real test will be whether this support reaches those most at risk and makes homes genuinely affordable to heat,” he said.
One Carmarthenshire homeowner who has already made the switch said it had transformed his home.
Adrian, who lives in a detached stone house built in the 1800s, turned to a heat pump when his oil boiler died and replacing it would have meant moving the oil tank into the middle of his driveway.
“We weren’t eco warriors,” he said. “We had to bite the bullet and look at other options.”
He said the work took about three days, and the house was now kept at a steady 19°C while he worked from home.
“The house has never been so warm,” he said. “We’ve got down to -6°C this winter and it was still warm in the house. The technology is amazing… I would say to go for it.”
The government said the grant uplift sat alongside its wider Warm Homes Plan, which it said would roll out clean technology to millions of homes.
Eligible households can check the scheme and find an accredited installer through the Boiler Upgrade Scheme.
