Warm Home Prescription® is a new service invented by Energy Systems Catapult and is being trialled across England and Scotland, helping people who struggle to afford energy and have severe health conditions made worse by the cold. The service allows them to stay warm and well at home, and out of hospital in winter whilst reducing the energy consumption and carbon emissions of their home.

The England and Scotland 2022-2024 trial aims to determine how providing a low carbon warm home can improve people’s health and reduce their use of the health service, saving the NHS money overall and easing pressure on frontline staff. A warm and healthy home must be central to any consumer-centred vision we have for changing how people use energy in their home as we move towards a smart, flexible Net Zero energy system.

The challenge

The UK is facing a huge challenge of ensuring that the energy system is designed to support all consumers now and in the future. A cost-of-living crisis and rising domestic energy prices have driven awareness in the importance of designing products and services that work for consumers in vulnerable situations. Living in a cold home puts millions of people with health conditions at particular risk of harm, such as those with respiratory diseases and cardio-vascular diseases. In 2020, 10,000 people are thought to have died as a result of living in a cold home.

Experts in our Fair Futures team realised that there must be a better solution to providing support. Drawing on previous research and studies aimed at supporting people with health conditions made worse by the cold, they asked the question:

What if the health service could prescribe a low carbon warm home to households who need it?

Buying the energy that the most vulnerable people need but cannot afford could help keep them stay warm and well at home, rather than becoming ill and needing costly care. Targeting can be significantly improved by working with the NHS, who know about the population’s health and the costs associated with living in a cold home.

The innovation

Energy Systems Catapult invented the Warm Home Prescription service in response to this challenge. We carried out a rapid discovery phase in 2020 and understood some key assumptions to test in future stages and trials. We concluded that GPs were unlikely to be an efficient way to identify the most vulnerable and many people needed working heating controls if they were chose to heat their home to healthy temperatures.

That’s how our Warm Home Prescription service works. During winter 2021-22, we piloted a small study with NHS Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and local energy advisor Severn Wye Energy Agency to show that it works on the ground.

Following the success of the 28-home 2021/22 Warm Home Prescription (WHP) pilot in Gloucestershire, Energy Systems Catapult, in partnership with local NHS partners and local energy advice organisations, undertook the largest trial of its kind in 2022/23, supporting 823 vulnerable and low-income individuals in Aberdeen, Middlesbrough, Gloucestershire and London. These groups are identified in the national health and social care advice (NICE Guideline NG6).

The service works to deliver rapid, practical help:

• NHS teams (including social prescribers and complex care teams linked to GP surgeries) identify eligible patients
• Patients are contacted by the NHS and offered a “warm home prescription” to be delivered by local energy advisors – who credit their energy account
• Patients can immediately start heating their home to a healthy temperature
• Further home energy upgrades are arranged where possible.

The project is funded by bp.

The impact

Warm Home Prescription® Insights and Impact Report

In summer 2023, the team behind WHP set out to understand whether providing longer-term solutions through energy efficiency measures and low carbon heating improvements, could produce sustainable warm home outcomes for householders. 92 residents in Aberdeen and Teesside who had previously received credit on their energy bills via Warm Home Prescription, this time received home energy improvements.

Key findings:

• People understand that achieving healthy temperatures is important because of the impact of experiencing a warm home outcome with a WHP of credit the previous year. Home energy improvements gave people confidence they would achieve healthy temperatures in winter 2023/24 and 81% thought they did at the end of the winter.
• Where people intentionally reduced their heat use to control costs, they reported reducing the number of heating hours rather than the temperature.
• From the available sample (n = 68), just over half of people that had home energy improvements achieved healthy temperatures above 18 degrees Celsius for most of the time.
• Most of that sample of people did not put their health at extreme risk, as temperatures above 16 degrees Celsius were achieved almost all the time.
• Of the same sample above (n=68), half of them achieved healthy temperatures across both winters (phase 1, 2022/23 and phase 2, 2023/24).
• Some people weren’t clear up front on what measures they would receive and therefore what the benefits would be, which prevented some from taking up the offer.
• Controls that are easy to use and make it easy to understand temperatures in different rooms are important to people and could drive uptake of WHP and help them achieve healthy temperatures with confidence.

Warm Home Prescription – Impact on Health & Wellbeing and Attitudes to Heat

Findings from the 2022/23 trial provide strong support for the impacts of the WHP project. Positive outcomes were reported by WHP recipients and healthcare professionals alike.

The trial overwhelmingly demonstrated the value of WHP to vulnerable and low-income individuals, with more than 4 out of 5 recipients heating their homes to warmer temperatures than in previous years. 51% of WHP recipients heated their homes to a much warmer temperature than before by at least 2 degrees.

During the trial, the health and wellbeing of individuals improved significantly owing to a warmer home:

• 79% of recipients found it had a positive impact on their physical health,
• 70% said that it improved their mental health.

Overall, 98% of WHP recipients would take part in the project again, with 93% placing greater importance on the need to stay warm in their homes.

Delivery staff on the project were satisfied with their experience, with 94% of healthcare professionals and 77% energy advisors reporting their satisfaction. Overall 93% of delivery staff would like to see WHP offered again during the winter. Benefits cited for this include:

• Reducing cost pressures on the NHS and freeing up beds in hospitals
• Proactively helping vulnerable people through the winter
• Reduce financial pressures for vulnerable and low income households
• Helping people to feel adequately warm and comfortable in their homes

Sheffield Hallam University has carried out an independent Impact and Value for Money assessment of Energy Systems Catapult’s Warm Home Prescription (WHP) project. It has been produced by the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research (CRESR) at Sheffield Hallam University.

Warm Home Prescription Taskforce recommendations

The Warm Home Prescription taskforce has set out four key recommendations that will ensure insights from the 2022/23 Warm Home Prescription trial across England and Scotland have an enduring impact on how the health and energy sectors can work together to enable people to stay warm and well at home.

The recommendations have drawn from insights on how the WHP service impacted people’s health and wellbeing and use of the health service. These recommendations have been produced through the discussions of the WHP Taskforce and the research and feedback that Energy Systems Catapult have on the Warm Home Prescription service.

1. Estimate the number of people at risk and where they live.
2. Improve knowledge exchange about energy and health sector collaborations.
3. Design future domestic energy support to allow households to achieve a warm healthy home.
4. Provide innovation funding to ensure there are future products and services that can provide households vulnerable to the cold with a warm, healthy home.