The Community Energy Saving Programme was an obligation on large UK

energy companies The energy industry is the totality of all of the industries involved in the production and sale of energy, including fuel extraction, manufacturing, refining and distribution. Modern society consumes large amounts of fuel, and the energy indust ...

to deliver

energy saving Energy conservation is the effort to reduce wasteful energy consumption by using fewer energy services. This can be done by using energy more effectively (using less energy for continuous service) or changing one's behavior to use less service (f ...

measures to low income households. The obligation came into force on 1 September 2009 and ran until 31 December 2012. CESP was designed as a pilot for an area based obligation, and the subsequent Energy Company Obligation includes a more flexible area-based component, the Carbon Saving Communities Obligation. Over 290,000 measures were delivered under CESP. Around half of these were forms of home insulation, and almost 40% were replacement boilers or heating controls provided with a new heating system. The programme delivered carbon savings of 16.31 million tons of CO₂, 84.7% of the target. Progress was slow at first, and the majority of the savings were only achieved in the final six months of the three-year programme. Three energy suppliers complied with their obligations under CESP:

EDF Energy EDF Energy is a British integrated energy company, wholly owned by the French state-owned EDF (Électricité de France), with operations spanning electricity generation and the sale of natural gas and electricity to homes and businesses through ...

, E.ON and

RWE npower Npower Limited is a British supplier of gas and electricity to businesses. It has been a subsidiary of E.ON UK since January 2019. The company was formerly known as Innogy plc and was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent ...

. Meanwhile,

British Gas British Gas (trading as Scottish Gas in Scotland) is an energy and home services provider in the United Kingdom. It is the trading name of British Gas Services Limited and British Gas New Heating Limited, both subsidiaries of Centrica. Servi ...

, SSE and

Scottish Power Scottish Power is a vertically integrated energy company based in Glasgow, Scotland. It is a subsidiary of Spanish utility firm Iberdrola. ScottishPower is the distribution network operator for Central and Southern Scotland, Merseyside, Nor ...

fell short, leaving

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considering whether to impose a financial penalty. Four independent generators were also set targets, with which only Eggborough Power complied.

References

{{Reflist Energy conservation in the United Kingdom