GOVERNMENT plans to phase out the sale of oil-fired central heating boilers have been described as ‘folly’ by Somerset MP Ian Liddell-Grainger.

Mr Liddell-Grainger said oil would continue to be the only suitable heating source for thousands of older, off-grid properties.

And, he said, the Government’s fixation with heat pumps and its outright rejection of the use of hydrogen as a domestic fuel source were indicators of its ‘dangerously blinkered’ approach to future home heating.

Ministers want oil-fired boiler sales to be phased out as part of a drive to achieve net zero, reduce oil imports, and protect consumers from volatile energy prices.

They also want to see 600,000 heat pumps installed every year by 2028 and argue that the more the sector expands the more consumers will benefit from lower unit costs.

But Mr Liddell-Grainger, who represents West Somerset and will be the Conservative candidate for a new constituency covering an area outside Wellington and in the Culm Valley, said rural areas were covered with thousands of properties where heat pumps were not, and never would be an option.

He said: “They are old and many are incapable of being adapted to a suitably high standard of insulation to enable a heat pump to work efficiently.

“In some cases the work could be carried out but it would be at the expense of the property’s character and would add tremendously to the actual installation cost.”

Mr Liddell-Grainger said it was the Government’s decision to turn its back on the replacement of natural gas by hydrogen that was most concerning.

He said: “It claims the cost is too high but adapting boilers to use hydrogen is a far less costly option than heat pumps - and there are 25 million homes connected to the gas grid where this could be easily achieved.

“The Energy Department has already supported research which shows that hydrogen will have no greater risk of leaks and explosion than natural gas - as well as a project which has demonstrated hydrogen can be successfully used in boilers, fires, and cookers.

“The fact is that the Government appears fixated on heat pumps because it cannot see beyond the huge estates of modern, well-insulated homes where they could conceivably be used.

“As usual, it is ignoring the circumstances of rural families living in older houses, of pensioners, and others on low incomes for whom heat pumps would either be unsuitable or unaffordable, or in many cases, both.”