Japan's Daikin says new UK net zero plan will undermine investment and growth (updated)

Daikin Industries

21/09/2023 16:23

(Adds context and comment in paragraphs 6, 7 and 8)
    By Andy Bruce
       LONDON, Sept 21 (Reuters) - Japanese industrial company
Daikin  6367.T , the market leader for heat pumps in Europe,
said Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's decision to push back
Britain's plans to tackle climate change will undermine
confidence and international investment.
    Daikin, the world's largest manufacturer of air conditioning
equipment, headquartered in Osaka, said Sunak's decisions would
make it harder to hit Britain's target to become a net zero
carbon economy by 2050.
        "With its policy update, the government seems to have
given up on its commitment to see up to 600,000 heat pumps being
installed a year by 2028," Henk van den Berg, residential sales
manager at Daikin UK, said in a statement on Thursday.
  
        "This is going to undermine confidence, foreign
investments, and will have a significant impact on the growth in
green jobs."
  
    In a speech on Wednesday, Sunak said he would slow the
transition to heat pumps from gas boilers in homes, and said he
would not force any household to improve their insulation.
    Heat pumps, sometimes described as reverse air conditioners,
use electricity to concentrate heat potential and are
comparatively more energy efficient than gas boilers.
    Berg said continuing to exclude hybrid heat pump systems -
which can operate alongside traditional heating sources like
boilers - from the government's Boiler Upgrade Scheme was a
"real misstep".
    Sunak said he remained committed to the legally-binding
target of reaching net zero emissions by 2050 but said Britain
could afford to make slower progress in getting there because it
was "so far ahead of every other country in the world".

 (Reporting by Andy Bruce, Editing by Kylie MacLellan and
William James)
 ((andy.bruce@thomsonreuters.com; +442075134461; Reuters
Messaging: @brucereuters))