British Gas has announced it will match-fund the Government's £400 boiler scrappage allowance.

This means customers buying a new boiler from British Gas can cut the cost by £800 this winter.

The announcement came as British Gas welcomed the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Energy & Climate Change, Ed Miliband, to its Energy Academy in Dartford - one of five British Gas academies, which train apprentice engineers to install and maintain energy-efficient boilers.

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British Gas has worked quickly to put match-funding in place following the Government's unveiling of its new boiler scrappage scheme in the Pre-Budget Report on 9 December 2009.

British Gas is the leading installer of energy efficient boilers in Britain. Each year, the company installs 120,000 new boilers, and trains between 300 and 500 engineers who fit and maintain them - as well as many other new energy technologies, such as solar panels.

Welcoming the Prime Minister, Sam Laidlaw, Chief Executive of Centrica, said: "If the UK is to meet its tough carbon reduction targets, it is vital that old, inefficient energy technologies are replaced. The Government's boiler scrappage scheme is, therefore, a very welcome initiative; it will assist the replacement of the country's four million inefficient domestic boilers with new boilers, which can improve energy efficiency by up to 30% - an important step towards lowering carbon emissions."

(CD/GK)