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Some of the forces shaping what your HVAC business is worth are things you do. This one is something the market does around you. The Clean Heat Market Mechanism moved into its second scheme year in April 2026, and the heat pump target rose with it. It is a quieter story than a grant headline, but for anyone weighing up buyer appetite it is one of the more important ones. It is one of the four forces in our September market briefing.

What Actually Changed in April

The Clean Heat Market Mechanism requires boiler manufacturers selling above set thresholds to ensure heat pumps make up a rising share of their relevant sales. In Year 1 that target was 6 per cent. For the 2026-27 scheme year, running from April 2026 to March 2027, it stepped up to 8 per cent. Manufacturers who fall short face financial consequences, which is what gives the mechanism its teeth.

The thresholds matter: the obligation bites on manufacturers above 20,000 gas or 1,000 oil boilers a year, so it is aimed at the volume end of the market. This is not a gentle encouragement. It is a statutory obligation with a rising number attached and a cost for missing it.

Why an Upstream Rule Changes Your Weather

The mechanism sits above your business, but it changes the conditions you trade in. When manufacturers are obliged to shift more heat pumps to hit a rising target, they push that demand down through their installer networks. That shows up as training places, incentives, marketing support and stock priority for the installers who can actually do the work.

For a competent installer, the effect is a market being actively pulled towards the work you are equipped to do, by policy rather than by fashion. That is a meaningful distinction. Fashion fades; a statutory obligation with a published, rising schedule does not.

A growth story built on sentiment is fragile. One built on a rising statutory target is exactly what a buyer wants under their investment case.

What It Means to a Buyer

This is where the mechanism touches valuation. A consolidator building an investment case around heat pump capability needs to believe the demand will still be there through their hold period, often five years or more. A rising statutory target does that reassurance for them. It converts "we think heat pump demand will grow" into "the law requires manufacturers to grow it".

That is why capability in this space, MCS accreditation, trained installers, a servicing offer covering heat pumps as well as boilers, keeps drawing competing interest even in a cautious deal market. The buyer is not betting on a trend. They are buying into a market with a policy floor under it.

The Refrigerant Angle Worth Noting

There is a related scarcity if you do refrigeration or air conditioning work. Under the GB F-Gas regime, the HFC phasedown reaches its next step on 1 January 2027, when refrigerant supply falls to 24 per cent of the 2015 baseline. Defra confirmed in 2026 that it would not legislate to change that schedule this year, so the step is coming as planned, now about a quarter away.

Tighter refrigerant supply makes certified F-Gas competence more valuable, not less, because the work still has to be done by someone qualified to do it. A business carrying that competence into 2027 is carrying an asset that the regulation is quietly repricing upward.

What To Do With This

You do not need to rebuild the business around heat pumps to benefit. The point is narrower: understand that the policy floor under electrified heating is real and rising on a published schedule, and position what you already do in those terms. If you hold MCS accreditation and F-Gas competence, make that visible and documented. From what we see, it is one of the clearer signals a buyer uses to decide where in the range an offer should land.