Housing associations and heat network regulation

Heat networks supply thousands of homes across the UK with heat and hot water. They are more common in social housing than other tenures and, as they will be critical to our mission to decarbonise home heating, new regulations are being developed to improve and expand their use.

We will update this page to keep you abreast of the changing landscape of heat network regulation. We also work closely with sector supplier Chirpy Heat on this topic.

About heat networks

What is a heat network?

A heat network is a mechanism for supplying heat and hot water to a home. Heat networks can be either communal, or district systems. Communal systems consist of a centralised large heating appliance (in more than 90% of current cases a gas boiler) located in the scheme (e.g. plant room in flats). District heat networks supply heat and hot water to a network of buildings and can have more varied heat sources (e.g. geothermal or waste heat). The majority of heat networks (85%) are communal, and despite district heat networks being larger – most domestic consumers are on communal schemes. Around 90% of heat networks supply residential buildings.

How many people use heat networks in the UK?

Official government data shows that there are over 14,000 heat networks in the UK (90% in England), serving around 500,000 households. Heat networks provide about 3% of nationwide heat consumption. They are often found in the social housing sector – in fact around 150,000 housing association households in England use heat networks. Around 30% of heat networks and 50% of consumers are in London. There is also a relatively higher presence of heat networks in the supported and older peoples’ social housing sector. OFGEM estimate 66% of all heat networks are based in social housing. 

However, the data on heat networks is not robust and in 2023, the Social Market Foundation used experimental EPC data to estimate that up to 900,000 UK households (or 1 in 25) are on heat networks, including one in 12 in social housing. The Heat Trust (the voluntary Code of Standards body for heat networks) has supported this as a more accurate picture of the scale of the sector.

Heat networks and the net zero target

Heat networks are ‘heat source agnostic’ and therefore are relatively easy to decarbonise by changing the heating source (e.g. changing from gas to a heat pump). They also benefit from economies of scale and a greater variety of heat sources than traditional domestic heating, e.g. using waste heat or geothermal sources. The government hopes that heat networks will provide at least 20% of heat demand by 2050, and that this will be from decarbonised heat sources. To make this a reality, a new regulatory regime is necessary.

During the energy crisis of 2022-24, many social landlords and residents on heat networks were facing higher energy bills than other consumers. This was because the energy (mostly gas) was not subject to the price cap and other government support. We successfully worked with the government and stakeholders to increase the support available to heat network residents in the form of the temporary Energy Bills Support Scheme Alternative Funding (EBSS AF), Energy Bill Relief Scheme (EBRS) and Energy Bill Discount Scheme (EBDS).