EPCs now under attack!

19th February 2026 | Caroline Vernon | Residential Property, Energy Efficiency, Landlords

Since 2020 privately rented homes in England and Wales have been required to meet a minimum standard of EPC with rating “E” unless a valid exemption applies. Landlords are required to invest up to £3,500 per property in order to meet this standard.

A consultation of the Energy Efficiency (Private Rented Property) (England and Wales) Regulations 2015 has recently closed and has sought views on proposals to amend these regulations to implement higher minimum energy efficiency standards in the private rented sector.

The Government confirms it will pursue amendments to these regulations to introduce higher minimum energy efficiency standards. These two standards are as follows:

1. A primary standard based on the building’s fabric; and
2. A secondary standard based on either the heating system or a smart metric.

Landlord will be free to choose which secondary metric to apply giving flexibility to retain existing heating systems or adopt alternative technologies such as solar or smart controls. The Government’s view is that the dual metric approach preserves tenant bills, savings and carbon reductions at a lever comparable to the existing EPC “C” proposal while avoiding the situation where landlords are penalised for installing low carbon heating such as heat pumps.

Landlords will be required to invest £10,000 per property on relevant energy efficiency improvements to bring the property up to standards. Where improvements costing up to this limit still do not bring the home to the required standard, the landlord may register an exemption lasting 10 years and continue to let the property during this time. When an exemption expires, the landlord must again carry out the energy efficiency works to attempt to meet the standards. The £10,000 limit is the maximum investment expected from a landlord over a 10 year period.

Landlords must take this into account when looking at their portfolio over the forthcoming years to upgrade EPC standard levels.

If you have any questions, or want to find out more contact the Residential Property team.