The Heat Training Grant will provide heating engineers with grants of up to £500 towards training.

DESNZ says the grant could cover most of the cost of a level 3 heat pump course, which takes one week or less for an experienced gas or oil heating installer to complete. In addition, heating manufacturers including Baxi, NIBE, Panasonic, Vaillant, Ideal Heating, and Worcester Bosch are expected to offer additional discounts and offers to participating trainees. These benefits could be worth up to a further £500 in product vouchers, additional training and other support, helping trainees put their new skills into practice.

The department is currently seeking expressions of interest from training providers to offer the grants for heat pump training. Once the training providers have signed up and received approval, plumbers/heating engineers will be able to claim the grant at the point they sign up for training with the provider.

Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, Lord Callanan, said: “This funding will give the rollout of heat pumps a huge boost by making them cheaper and easier to install, and importantly helping more households move away from costly fossil fuels.

“But we need a skilled workforce to deliver this, so we’re training thousands of people to be experts at installing heat pumps and heat networks, driving the country’s push towards net-zero. 

“We’re also making sure the cost of installing a heat pump is more affordable than ever before through grants of up to £6,000 through the Boiler Upgrade Scheme and a zero rate on VAT. So, it’s right we also put funding in place to train installers to meet demand.”

The government already funds heat pump training through the Home Decarbonisation Skills Competition, however the new, additional funding through the Heat Training Grant will extend support for heat pumps until at least 2025, and also goes further by including training for heat networks.

The heat networks training courses will cover the full lifecycle of the systems from initial design to building, operation, and maintenance. Government is also aiming to develop a series of courses and online training videos for heat networks operation and maintenance.

By providing heat networks training support alongside heat pumps, areas of overlap and collaboration can be better explored, particularly around the installation of large-scale heat pumps for heat networks and shared ground loops.