Three weeks to keep a decarbonisation programme moving:

When a council’s decarbonisation contractor entered administration in the middle of a live, multi-million-pound programme, the authority had half-finished works across its estate and government funding tied to deadlines it could not move. PfH had already given the council a compliant route to market through our Decarbonisation and Retrofit Framework. When the collapse came, the same framework let the council appoint a replacement and get works moving again within about three weeks. 

THE PROBLEM 

A funding-led programme, an incumbent supplier, and then a contractor collapse mid-delivery 

The council runs a substantial decarbonisation programme covering both its homes and its public buildings. The early work focused on social housing, connecting high-rise blocks to low carbon heating and replacing ageing electric storage heaters that were expensive for residents and carbon heavy. The programme then widened into the council’s public buildings, installing heat pumps across schools, leisure centres, civic buildings and other sites. 

Almost all of it depended on government grant funding, and that funding shapes how these programmes run. Before a bid can even be submitted, schemes have to be designed, plant locations identified and planning permission applied for, all ahead of any confirmation that the money will come. The council had been working with a specialist energy efficiency contractor on that early stage work. Once the bids succeeded, the council needed a compliant route to move quickly into delivery with the supplier that had designed the schemes. 

With the housing upgrades largely delivered and the public buildings phase under way, that contractor entered administration, leaving works part-finished across multiple sites. The grant funding was released in stages, some works were urgent, and several sites had completion dates only weeks away. A stalled programme risked the funding itself. 

THE SOLUTION 

A compliant route to market, and a replacement supplier on site in about three weeks 

The council joined our Decarbonisation and Retrofit Framework, which gave it a compliant basis to work with its chosen contractor without wasting the design and funding-application effort already invested. 

When we began hearing that the contractor was in difficulty, we did not wait for confirmation. We went to the council proactively, set out the alternative suppliers on the framework best placed to take the works to completion, and gave our word that we would find a solution. 

By the time the administration was confirmed, the council already had options in front of it. We convened meetings between the council and four suppliers from the framework, each chosen for their capacity to pick up part-finished works at pace. Every supplier presented their relevant experience, references and, critically, how quickly they could start. The commercial position was delicate, because any incoming supplier had to take on responsibility for work already carried out by subcontractors it had not appointed, and the council’s remaining funding had to accommodate that. Following those meetings, the council appointed a replacement contractor from the framework, who took on the part-finished works and carried them through to completion. 

The affected work spanned more than a dozen sites across the council’s public estate, from schools and leisure centres to a depot and civic and heritage buildings, several of them only weeks from their funding deadlines. It is a demanding estate to inherit mid-delivery, with different building types, technologies and timescales running at once. 

The speed is the story. From the contractor entering administration to a replacement cleared to begin work was about three weeks, with no fresh procurement exercise and no lost funding. 

THE RESULTS 

A partner who stayed close when it mattered most 

The outcome that mattered most to the council was not having to face this alone. When a contractor collapses mid-programme, a team is suddenly holding commercial risk, funding deadlines and hard questions all at once. We stayed close throughout: doing the legwork on which suppliers could take the works on, handling the difficult conversations, and giving the council a clear path through rather than a problem to solve on its own. The programme kept moving, the staged funding was protected, and the most urgent works carried on with only weeks of disruption rather than months. 

That resilience sits on top of a programme already delivering at scale. On the social housing side, an early tranche of upgrades cut some residents’ energy bills by around a half and their carbon emissions by roughly two thirds. On the public buildings side, a multi-million-pound programme is decarbonising dozens of buildings and cutting thousands of tonnes of carbon a year. 

A framework gives you a compliant route to market. What made the difference here was the partner on the other end of it: people who saw the difficulty coming, moved before being asked, and treated the council’s problem as their own. For our members, that is the real value. Not just a compliant route when things are going well, but a team that stands with you when a contractor fails.