Heat pump interest soars among households with oil boilers, energy firm says

Emily Beament, Press Association Environment Correspondent

The number of people with oil boilers considering a shift to heat pumps has more than trebled following the latest fuel crisis, an energy company has said.

Octopus said around 10,000 heating oil and LPG customers enquired about a heat pump in the first half of this year, an increase of 230% on the same period in 2025.

It attributes the increase to the Iran War, which put pressure on oil supplies and sent costs soaring, and the Government move to increase the grant for replacing oil boilers with electric heat pumps to £9,000.

The number of people actually making the switch away from oil boilers to heat pumps also almost trebled in the 12 weeks after the Government said it would boost the grant, compared to the previous 12 weeks, Octopus sales figures show.

Experts have said families reliant on oil boilers, which heat around 5% of homes, could save hundreds of pounds a year on running costs with a switch to heat pumps.

In April, grants under the “boiler upgrade scheme”, which provides £7,500 for households to replace their fossil fuel boiler with a heat pump, were increased to £9,000 for properties reliant on heating oil and LPG, following price spikes driven by the Iran War.

The increased grant became available from this week, but Octopus said it has applied the £9,000 discount on enquiries made since the announcement.

Overall, 550,000 customers enquired about a heat pump in the past year, Octopus said, with the vast majority looking at a switch away from gas boilers which heat most of the UK’s homes.

TJ Root, heat pump programme director at Octopus Energy, said: “Heat pumps are the single most efficient way to heat a home.

“With demand from oil and LPG customers trebling, it’s clear households are choosing a cheaper, cleaner alternative over unpredictable oil price spikes.”

Mark Tiller, who inherited a house in rural Suffolk with an oil boiler, chose to invest in a heat pump to modernise the home and make it easier to extend the property, as well as save on costs and do something for the climate.

Mr Tiller, a plumber, used Octopus to install the heat pump last year, with the cost just over £4,000 after the then-£7,500 grant, and said he was “relieved” he had the new clean tech in place when the conflict in Iran broke out, and was now saving around 30% on his bill.

“I had heard lots of horror stories from other people about air source heat pumps, and that the whole house has to be redone,” he said, but it was not the case.

The pump was cleaner than the oil boiler, quieter than he expected and the heating system worked differently from his old boiler, which is “just something you’ve got to get used to”.

But, he said: “The house has maintained a very comfortable heat throughout last winter, so I was impressed.”

He is now looking into solar panels as well, and said both cost and interest in green technology had played a part in his decision to go with a heat pump – pointing to the three heatwaves this summer as evidence of a changing climate.

“So I’m just trying to be a little bit more responsible for the future,” he said.

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