Heat pumps: Fast-growing Sheffield green heating company set to hire 30 as Government announces boiler grants

Greener Living has spent almost £1m on new premises in Attercliffe and has £10m turnover just four years after being launched.

Today it employs more than 50, after announcing an ambition to hire 30 in June, and claims to be the biggest air source heat pump company in the UK.

Its phenomenal growth comes as the UK ramps up efforts to become ‘net carbon neutral’ by 2050.

Fuelling demand is a ban on new domestic gas boilers from 2025 and big subsidies for people who convert now.

The government has just announced subsidies of £5,000 from next April to homeowners replace gas boilers with low-carbon heat pumps.

The grants for 90,000 pumps are part of a £3.9bn government plan to cut carbon emissions from heating buildings.

A Greener Living spokesman said: “We have a lot of people converting from oil and LPG and people doing Grand Design projects. But you don’t have to be a millionaire and it’s not always about cost, a lot of people want to go green to do their bit. Some people are having it done know because they know the subsidies won’t lost forever.

“We are a renewable energy company doing our bit to tackle climate change from our home town Sheffield. ”

The pumps draw in and compress outside air, creating heat, which is passed through a refrigerant, further warming it up. They are often installed in conjunction with larger radiators. The system is so efficient it works down to minus 15 degrees, it is claimed.

Greener Living started in a flat before moving to a small unit in Ecclesfield and then a larger one, and eventually making the leap to Waterside Court, Bold Street, Attercliffe.

The new premises will have offices, a showroom and a training centre. The company is investing heavily in skills because the industry is so new they have to find engineers and train them, they say.

So far, Greener Living has installed 2,000 pumps, including some 300 in Sheffield.

In total 30,000 were installed in the UK last year. The government wants to hit 600,000-a-year by 2025 and ‘decarbonise’ social housing by 2030.

And then there are the commercial premises, factories and public buildings, such as hospitals, to do too. So there is loads to go at.

The spokesman added: “It’s been amazing, but we are more driven than ever and trying to get into the commercial sector. It feels like we’re only just getting started.”

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Thank you. Nancy Fielder, editor.