Heating Checklist

 2026

We are updating the guidance on the Buildings and Churchyards pages of the Diocesan website about church heating. The following documents are already available and will form part of the overall guidance.

Heating Flowchart 

If you are considering making changes to your church heating, have a look at this flowchart first to see what the most appropriate approach might be to heating your church.

Heating Checklist 

Please complete this checklist (adapted for the Diocese of St Albans from the Church of England checklist) as a starting point for any proposal for church heating. It will provide the information the PCC, its Professional Advisers and the DAC will need to understand your context and requirements.

Template for heating applications

Under the Faculty Rules changes in July 2022, parishes must now show that they have considered the relevant advice from the Church Buildings Council. You can do this in whatever way you feel is best, but we have provided a template document you can use which asks you questions about the guidance and how you have used it to help inform your decision-making.

Pew heater location and effectiveness

The Net Zero Carbon Officer has recently undertaken some research to understand the impact that the location of convective pew heaters has on their effectiveness. It turns out that where they are located will have a big impact on their performance.  If your pew heaters aren’t located directly underneath the pew seat then the report is worth a quick look (it’s mostly pictures) to see if there may be an opportunity to improve the effectiveness of your heating system and reduce your running costs and carbon emissions.

Here you will find a directory of environment resources on a wide range of topics from Land and Nature to Net Zero Carbon.

Environment Resources February 2023-3

Environment Resources June 2023

Environment Resources July 2024

Environment Resources October 2025

The DAC’s advice for the installation on churches.

Historic England have produced some advice on installing solar panels and Tom Abraham, the Net Zero Carbon Officer, has written a blog post on solar panels.

Resources from the Meeting the Big NZC Heating Challenge: Heating Advice Project which explored heating in four churches in the Diocese of St Albans.

Biggleswade Case Study

Great Gaddesden Case Study

Oxhey St Matthew Case Study final

Stevenage St Peter case study

Have you started to think about how to respond to the Church of England’s call to action to reach Net Zero Carbon by 2030? Do you want to know what you could be doing now? The DAC has put together this advice in light of its strategy so that you can consider how best to respond as a church.

To help you enter your church’s energy usage figures into the Energy Footprint Tool, we have prepared a step-by-step video User Guide which you can pause and go through at your own pace. If you prefer, you can download a pdf version of the instructions.

Please note that some of the questions have changed slightly from 2022, so you no longer need to calculate person hours and you now need to provide details of work-related travel expenses and the number of hours per week the building is open.

General Net Zero Carbon Resources

The resources below will help you look at the bigger picture of your church energy use and what you need to consider when looking to reduce that use.

This is a great introductory resource which includes interactive images which covers the range of changes which could be made to your church building. As it says at the beginning of the page, No one church could, or should, do everything, so take a look and see what could be most appropriate and viable options to research further.

Net Zero Carbon Church – Church of England

The Practical Path is a key resource which helps you to plan your church’s journey to net zero carbon. It includes some initial low cost ‘quick wins’ which will help you improve efficiency before looking at more major changes. We encourage every parish to complete the Practical Path. It also forms a key supporting document in any application for heating/renewables.

The Practical Path to Net Zero Carbon for Churches – Church of England

The Church of England’s Environment Programme’s webinars are excellent resources. They are generally under an hour and cover a wide range of topics, from particular technologies such as heat pumps in churches, solar panels, and electric heating, to wider advice, such as quick wins, permissions and conservation.

Net Zero Carbon Webinars – Church of England

Heating

Heating makes up over 80% of the carbon use of an average church, so it is understandable that you will want to look at what changes you could make to your heating system to reduce energy use. It is important to note that heating most church buildings is complex and we strongly advise you to get professional advice from a heating consultant if at all possible. These resources will help you to be an informed client and should help you to prepare a brief for your professional.

Heating – Church of England

The Church Buildings Council’s advice on heating is excellent. It is helpfully divided into bitesize chunks so you can take it at your own pace. In particular, we advise you to look at the following pieces of guidance:

• Heating Principles – reading this as a first step will help you to frame any proposals and will ensure that you understand the key principles involved in church heating
• Heating Checklist – it is also very helpful for your to complete this at an early stage. It will help you to consider your wants and needs in terms of heating, as well as understanding your current system better. It would be helpful to share this with any professionals working with you
• Heating options appraisals – this sets out how you should be looking at the options available to you, including how to set out what you have considered as an important supporting document to any application.

Template for heating applications

Under the Faculty Rules changes in July 2022, parishes must now show that they have considered the relevant advice from the Church Buildings Council. You can do this in whatever way you feel is best, but we have provided a template document you can use which asks you questions about the guidance and how you have used it to help inform your decision-making.

The Church Building’s Council has updated their guidance to include information on Hydrogen and Hydrotreated Vegetable Oils (HVO) as part of future heating systems. The short version is that “hydrogen is not likely to be practically and economically viable for use in the short and medium term for heating churches”, and that they “do not support the adoption of HVO as part of the move to net-zero carbon”.  There are some caveats around the HVO position and it could change in the future if there is resolution of some issues around the whole life carbon emissions including the knock-on effects on global land use change and deforestation, but is unlikely to change in the short/medium term. You can read the full position statement on the national church website.

As outlined above, the Church of England’s webinars are such a helpful tool in exploring how heating options work for church buildings.

Net Zero Carbon Webinars – Church of England