Octopus Energy has announced the launch of its solar and heat pump referral scheme, offering £100 worth of incentives.
This initiative, driven by the goal of decarbonising UK households, will allow anyone who gets a heat pump or solar system installation from Octopus to refer friends and family for their own low-carbon technology installation.
Those referring will pocket £100, while those having the tech installed will get a £100 discount on the fitting. Octopus Energy retail customers can get a £100 credit on their account, while others will receive a widely accepted e-voucher of the same value.
The scheme was launched as the government announced a significant surge in demand for heat pumps, with applications for the Boiler Upgrade Scheme (BUS) grant increasing by 75% year-on-year (YoY) in February.
According to the government, this marks the fourth month there have been more than 2,000 applications since grants for air source and ground source heat pumps increased to £7,500.
This means the monthly average for applications received between November 2023 and February 2024 is 45% higher than the monthly average before the grant uplift.
By switching to a specialist heat pump tariff like ‘Cosy Octopus’, households can save £222 a year compared to running a boiler, Octopus data shows.
Rebecca Dibb-Simkin, chief product officer at Octopus Energy, said: “Our approach has always been to put money back into people’s pockets, and we will happily give away another £100 million in referrals as savvy customers take advantage of our heat pump offer – and help speed up the clean heating revolution along the way.”
Partnering projects
Octopus Energy has a storied history of launching trials and services which aid the development of domestic small-scale solar installations in the UK.
This includes its partnership with National Grid to speed up the installation of domestic roof-mounted solar panels.
The new agreement means that Octopus Energy engineers can upgrade a customer’s home fuse themselves during a domestic low-carbon technology installation.
This change will allow residents to potentially avoid an additional 10 weeks of installation processes that would otherwise be necessary.
National Grid has already assessed the impact of future roof-mounted solar installations on the local electricity grid to ensure it can accommodate the extra power needed and has pre-approved them for connections across its entire network.
Also, in December 2023, Octopus Energy announced a new partnership with housebuilder The Hill Group to build 89 solar-powered and energy bill-free homes.
The houses will be equipped with a number of low-carbon technologies, including solar panels. The combined capacity of these technologies is set to exceed the energy requirements of each home and will be integrated and optimised by Octopus’ Kraken platform.