Future of the Gas Grid

Debate between Josh Newbury and Andrew Pakes

Wednesday 18th June 2025 Westminster Hall

[Josh Newbury]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention and I pay tribute to him for all his years of work in the gas industry and for the knowledge that he brings to the House and indeed to this debate. I look forward to hearing from him later.

Previously, I worked for the Energy and Utilities Alliance, which is a trade association primarily representing companies in the gas heating industry. Recently, however, I had a heat pump installed at home, so I will not be using gas at all in future. I am certainly not a believer in silver bullets or dominant solutions. That heat pump cost £15,000, though, and the installation was fraught with complications, so it is fair to say that I have mixed views in this space.

Gas is an essential part of our energy system, accounting for 40% of the UK’s total energy consumption and about a third of total electricity generation. Crucially, it provides vital flexibility to make up for peaks and troughs in generation from renewables, which should of course be our focus—but they cannot be the whole solution for the foreseeable future. Indeed, the Government’s clean power by 2030 mission foresees a role for gas power stations as flexible generation for up to 5% of demand, but it will take a huge amount of energy storage to enable us to reduce our gas usage for power generation even to that level.

Looking ahead, the National Infrastructure Commission and the Climate Change Committee have recognised that gas, in one form or another, will continue to play a vital role in the energy system for decades to come, as a crucial component of a diverse and secure energy supply. All realistic projections for the UK’s energy transition envisage a continued role for gas, alongside carbon capture and storage and hydrogen, which I will come on to.

A key area of interest to me—and, I am sure, to every Member wishing to contribute to this debate—is the role of gas in domestic heating. Nationally, the gas grid serves more than 24 million homes and half a million businesses. It carries three times more energy than the electricity grid does annually and, on peak winter days, that figure rises to five times as much. Eighty-three per cent of homes rely on mains gas, and in my Cannock Chase constituency 95% of households are on the gas grid. Meanwhile, 6,460 households in my towns and villages live in fuel poverty.

Given that gas heating is clearly the cheapest form of domestic heating we have today, the future of the gas grid is not just a technical issue, but a cost of living issue. Heat pumps are a potential solution for many homes, in particular those off the gas grid, but we have to be honest about the persistent cost barriers. With the average heat pump installation coming in at about £13,000 and only just over half of that paid for by the £7,500 boiler upgrade scheme, heat pumps are clearly still the preserve of able-to-pay households and niche house builders.

[Andrew Pakes (Peterborough) (Lab)]

The Government are doing really important work on social justice and the environment, but my constituency is similar to my hon. Friend’s in terms of fuel poverty. Is he aware that, of the £300 million spent on the boiler upgrade scheme over the past few years, only 3% of grants in Cambridgeshire went to Peterborough, the poorest constituency? As we advance and develop these schemes, we need to root social justice alongside carbon reduction.

[Josh Newbury]

I could not have put it better myself. My hon. Friend must have been reading my mind, because I was about to come to that point about my neck of the woods.

My fear is that, without a substantial shift in the cost barrier and a clear focus by the Government on inequality, as my hon. Friend said, decarbonisation inequality will widen. That inequality is apparent in the number of boiler upgrade scheme vouchers issued in the three years to March this year. That stood at just 27 for my Cannock Chase constituency but 316—nearly 12 times as many—in North Devon.

One solution that is not spoken about as much as it perhaps should be is the hybrid heat pump—the combination of a combi boiler with a smaller heat pump. Those systems typically use the heat pump for space heating and hot water production almost exclusively for most of the year, with the gas boiler supplementing it on cold days or when a boost of heat is needed.