Dutch energy bills are set to rise by about 10 per cent in real terms over the next five years, and the increase would be sharpest for households that have already installed a heat pump.
That is the finding of government-commissioned research summarised in a draft cabinet letter due before ministers on September 11, public broadcaster NOS reported.
A large majority of households would pay €400 to €600 more a year by 2031 than they do now.
Climate and green growth minister Stientje van Veldhoven writes that homes with gas boilers would still have the highest average bill, around €2,800 a year, even though they are often smaller dwellings.
District heating customers would pay about €2,650. Hybrid heat pump homes would move towards almost €2,400.
Homes heated only by a heat pump, and no longer connected to gas, would see bills rise by about 70 per cent. That is the largest percentage increase.
Their average bill in 2031 would still be the lowest of the groups studied, at about €1,200. The researchers therefore still call the investment attractive.
The Dutch will have to invest nearly €200 billion over the next few years to keep the power grid running in line with the “green” transition, according to operators. https://t.co/8DEBH825Jm
— Brussels Signal (@brusselssignal) March 3, 2025
Nevertheless, they had paid thousands of euros to install heat pumps to begin with. Consumer advice body Milieu Centraal puts a typical hybrid system at about €6,200 including installation and an all-electric one at around €12,000, before subsidy.
The main driver is higher grid charges. Grid operators are passing on the cost of expanding a congested electricity network.
Heat pump households use more power, often have solar panels and are due to lose the net-metering scheme that has allowed them to offset surplus generation, when it ends on January 1, 2027.
Fossil fuel pricing, including the EU’s ETS2 emissions trading system for buildings and road transport, due to start in 2028 after a one-year delay, and a green gas blending obligation planned from 2027, also lifts the bill for those who still burn gas.
Separate industry calculations already warned that time- and volume-based grid tariffs planned from 2029 would add hundreds of euros a year for all-electric and hybrid homes, because heat pumps run hardest on winter evenings when the proposed peak charges would apply.
That analysis, by consultancy Common Futures for the Dutch Heat Pump Association, put the extra cost at €505 a year for an all-electric home, €355 of it from the new tariffs. The proposal by grid operators’ association Netbeheer Nederland would set the higher rate between 4pm and 11pm in the winter half of the year.
Successive Dutch governments presented the technology as the standard way off Groningen gas, whose extraction was halted after it triggered earthquakes in the north of the country, and imported fossil fuel.
A government investment subsidy for sustainable energy and energy saving (ISDE) pays part of the purchase and installation cost: About €2,125 for a typical hybrid and €3,025 for an all-electric unit, according to Milieu Centraal. Cheap loans through the National Heat Fund were marketed on the same promise.
New-build rules already push all-electric or hybrid systems.
In 2022 the cabinet of then prime minister Mark Rutte planned to make a hybrid heat pump the minimum when a boiler was replaced from 2026, with exceptions only for unsuitable homes or a heat network connection. That national mandate was dropped by the subsequent government of Dick Schoof in October 2024.
The current coalition, led by Prime Minister Rob Jetten, still wants hybrid and smart heat pumps stimulated and, from 2029, made the required standard where a heat network is not the better option. Municipalities are due to gain more power from 2027 to take neighbourhoods off gas.
Campaigns from Milieu Centraal, the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO) and energy companies repeated the same message.
A heat pump cuts gas use and, on today’s tariffs, usually lowers the annual bill. Statistics Netherlands (CBS) counted 2.6 million heat pumps at the end of 2024, though almost three-quarters were air-to-air units, better known as air conditioners. It found 8.6 per cent of homes were heated mainly by electricity, largely through heat pumps.
Van Veldhoven says the projected rise does not run far ahead of expected savings and income growth, and that grid investment reduces dependence on foreign oil and gas. The letter notes that the recent Middle East conflict has already added about €4 billion to Dutch oil and gas costs.