Heat Pump Grants Northern Ireland 2026

Heat Pump Grants in Northern Ireland: There Aren't Any

Short answer, so you're not reading three screens to find it: Northern Ireland has no heat pump grant. Not a smaller one, not a harder-to-get one. Nothing in NI puts money towards an air source heat pump the way the £7,500 Boiler Upgrade Scheme does in England and Wales, or the £7,500 grant plus £7,500 interest-free loan does in Scotland.

Plenty of pages will tell you to "check NISEP" or "apply for Affordable Warmth". We've read the published measure lists for both. Neither funds heat pumps. So this page does the more useful thing: it explains what those two schemes actually pay for, flags the one thing that might change in April 2027, and works through what a heat pump really costs to run in NI when nobody is subsidising it. Some of that is encouraging. Some of it isn't.

Why There's No Boiler Upgrade Scheme Here

Energy policy is devolved. The Boiler Upgrade Scheme is administered by Ofgem under regulations covering England and Wales, Scotland runs its own Home Energy Scotland Grant and Loan, and Northern Ireland's schemes sit with the Department for Communities, the Housing Executive and the Utility Regulator. NI's fuel poverty money has historically gone into insulation and into replacing the very worst heating systems, not into low-carbon heat. That's a policy choice, not an oversight, and it's worth raising with your MLA.

What the Affordable Warmth Scheme Actually Funds

Affordable Warmth is run by the Northern Ireland Housing Executive for households with a total annual gross income below £23,000 who own and occupy their home, hold a life interest in it, or rent from a private landlord. Housing Executive and housing association tenants aren't eligible, and it doesn't cover holiday homes, B&Bs or commercial premises.

The Housing Executive publishes its measure list in priority order, and heat pumps are not on it:

• Priority 1, insulation, ventilation and draught-proofing: loft insulation installed or topped up to 300mm, roof, loft and eaves ventilation, a hot water cylinder jacket, cavity wall insulation where the property suits it, draught proofing to doors and windows, and removal and replacement of ineffective cavity wall insulation
• Priority 2, heating: replacing solid fuel, LPG or Economy 7 by providing natural gas or oil central heating; converting Economy 7 to a high-efficiency electric storage system where gas and oil aren't available; and boiler replacement or system upgrade where the boiler is at least 15 years old and the householder is over 65, has a child getting Child Benefit or Kinship payments, or receives DLA, PIP or Attendance Allowance
• Priority 3, windows: replacing single glazed windows
• Priority 4, solid wall measures: solid wall insulation, detached properties only, and the Housing Executive expects you to complete the other measures first

The Housing Executive works to a whole house approach and you must complete the measures in priority order. You can turn one down, but you can't move the money to something else: you simply lose that part of the grant.

Read that heating bullet again. In 2026 the scheme's answer to a failed heating system is still a new oil or gas boiler. Grant aid runs to £7,500, or up to £10,000 where a solid wall home needs insulation, and you shouldn't have to contribute anything towards the work that's agreed. Grants are also subject to the availability of funding, which is worth knowing before you plan around one.

One practical correction to what a lot of sites tell you: don't ring the Housing Executive switchboard. NIHE routes every Affordable Warmth applicant through the NI Energy Advice Service on 0800 111 44 55 (or NIenergyadvice@nihe.gov.uk). They check you meet the entry requirements and send out the application form, which you return to your local Grant Office with proof of ownership or tenancy, residence and income.

NISEP: Not for Heat Pumps, and Not Through Your Supplier

The Northern Ireland Sustainable Energy Programme is funded by a levy on electricity bills, overseen by the Utility Regulator and administered by Energy Saving Trust. At least 80% of the money is reserved for vulnerable or "priority" customers.

Two things are worth knowing. First, the funding is set annually. The Utility Regulator publishes a fresh List of Schemes each year (the 2026/27 list is out), delivered by 11 registered Scheme Managers, and what's on offer genuinely changes from one year to the next. The published categories are priority whole-house solutions covering heating and insulation, priority individual measures, and non-priority schemes. Heat pumps aren't a named category in any of them.

Second, and this trips up a lot of people: you don't apply through your electricity supplier. You find a scheme on the Utility Regulator's current list, check you're eligible, and contact that Scheme Manager directly on the number they publish. If that feels like hard work, ring NI Energy Advice on 0800 111 44 55 and ask them to point you at one.

What Might Change: the Warm Healthy Homes Fund, April 2027

The Department for Communities is developing the Warm Healthy Homes Fund, described as its main fuel poverty and energy efficiency intervention for private sector homes, both owner-occupied and privately rented. DfC says it will replace the Affordable Warmth Scheme and is expected to become the main fuel poverty intervention for private sector dwellings from April 2027, taking a whole-house, fabric-first approach. The public consultation ran from May 2026 and closed on 19 August 2026, with final development and implementation scheduled from April 2027.

Whether it will fund heat pumps hasn't been published. The scheme rules aren't final, and we're not going to guess at them. Here's the practical read: if you're on a low income and your heating is limping rather than dead, it may be worth seeing what lands in April 2027 before accepting a replacement oil boiler under the current rules. If your boiler has actually failed, don't wait, because there's no guarantee the new fund covers heat pumps at all.

The Unsubsidised Numbers: Heat Pump vs Oil

61% of Northern Ireland households use oil central heating as their main heat source, against 36% on gas (NISRA Continuous Household Survey, 2024/25). So the question that actually matters here isn't which grant you get, it's whether swapping oil for a heat pump pays for itself with no grant at all.

NI-specific figures matter, because the Ofgem price cap doesn't apply here. Northern Ireland's electricity is regulated separately by the Utility Regulator, and it costs noticeably more than in Great Britain, partly because domestic electricity in NI still carries 5% VAT.

• Electricity: 32.10p/kWh including VAT on Power NI's Eco Energy tariff paying monthly by direct debit with online billing, rising to 34.15p on the undiscounted standard rate
• Heating oil: 113.52p/litre (UK average for a 1,000 litre order), which at 10.35 kWh per litre works out at 10.97p/kWh of fuel

Convert both into the cost of a kWh of actual heat in the house:

Now put a year's heating through it. 12,000 kWh of heat is a fair figure for a three-bed semi that isn't badly insulated:

So yes, a well-designed heat pump is cheaper to run than oil in Northern Ireland. But the gap is a few hundred pounds a year, not the £600 to £1,200 figure that gets thrown around. The break-even point against an 85% oil boiler is a SCOP of 2.49. Below that, at today's NI prices, your oil boiler wins on running cost. A badly designed heat pump running high flow temperatures into small radiators can absolutely land below 2.49.

What That Means for Payback

An air source heat pump in NI, with no grant, is typically £10,000 to £14,000 installed. Save £400 a year and a £12,000 install takes roughly 30 years to pay back. That is not an investment case, and anyone presenting it as one is selling you something.

The comparison changes when your oil boiler is already dead, because then you're spending money either way. A replacement oil boiler is £3,500 to £5,000 fitted, so the extra you're paying for the heat pump is more like £5,000 to £10,500, and at £400 a year that's about 13 to 26 years. Still long. But it's the honest comparison at the moment most people actually make the decision.

One real discount does apply in NI: heat pump installations are zero-rated for VAT, and HMRC's VAT Notice 708/6 says that zero rate runs to 31 March 2027 before reverting to 5%. On a £12,000 install that's £600, and it has a date on it.

Honest Assessment: NI vs the Rest of the UK

What to Actually Do

1. Income under £23,000? Ring NI Energy Advice on 0800 111 44 55 and ask about Affordable Warmth. Go in expecting insulation plus an oil or gas boiler, because that's what the measure list covers. The insulation is worth having whatever you heat with.
2. Check this year's NISEP list. Look up the Utility Regulator's current List of Schemes, find one you're eligible for, and contact that Scheme Manager directly. Your electricity supplier can't process it for you.
3. On a low income and not in a rush? Keep an eye on the Warm Healthy Homes Fund from April 2027 before you commit to a like-for-like boiler swap.
4. Paying for it yourself? Get quotes from MCS-certified installers and judge them on design, not price. Insist on a room-by-room heat loss survey and a design flow temperature of 45°C or lower. SCOP is the only thing standing between "saves me £449 a year" and "costs me more than the oil did", and it's decided at the design stage.
5. Insulate first. Every kWh of heat you don't need is a kWh you don't pay 12.91p or 9.17p for, and it lets you fit a smaller, cheaper unit.

The gap in NI support is real, and we're not going to pretend a heat pump is a no-brainer here the way it is in England with £7,500 attached. But if your oil boiler is on its last legs, the running costs do favour the heat pump, and the VAT clock runs out on 31 March 2027.