What was claimed
25% of your electricity bill is down to costs associated with Net Zero.
Our verdict
Our analysis of Ofgem figures suggests this is too high. While the precise figure may vary depending on which costs you define as being related to Net Zero, costs that Ofgem said could be considered Net Zero-related account for around 20% of an electricity-only bill.
What was claimed
40% of the recently announced energy price rise is due to costs associated with Net Zero.
Our verdict
Our analysis of Ofgem figures suggests this is also too high. About 12% of the energy price cap increase in April was due to costs the regulator told us may be associated with Net Zero. But what should be counted as a Net Zero-related cost is contested.
A post shared on Facebook in February claimed that “25% of your total electricity bill” and “40% of today’s energy price rise” are down to “Net Zero nonsense”.
Estimates of Net Zero’s impact on bills vary depending on what’s counted, and which costs should be counted is disputed. It is an issue which generates strong opinions, where producing precise figures is difficult.
But our analysis of figures provided by Ofgem, based on the costs the regulator said could be considered Net Zero-related, is that both figures in the Facebook post are too high.
It’s not clear exactly what these claims were based on. They appear to refer to the energy price cap, which limits the maximum amount that can be charged for each unit of gas and electricity. Ofgem, which regulates UK gas and electricity markets, reviews and adjusts the cap every three months.
As well as the headline energy price cap, which refers to a typical household on a dual fuel (electricity and gas) bill paying by direct debit, there are separate price caps for electricity and gas-only bills.
We’ve previously fact checked a claim about how much of an energy or electricity bill goes towards so-called “green levies”, a term often used to describe what’s paid towards government social and environmental schemes (or “policy costs”).
Some of the money from these costs goes towards large-scale renewable energy projects, but they are also used to fund a range of other environmental and social policies, including the Warm Home Discount. So not all of these costs go towards ‘Net Zero’ policies.
There are also other costs beyond these environmental policy costs which are linked to Net Zero, though there’s debate over which should be counted.
Our analysis of Ofgem figures suggests around 20% of a typical household electricity-only bill (paid by direct debit) is due to the costs which it told us may be associated with Net Zero, up from around 19% at the time the Facebook post was first published. But some have argued a narrower set of costs should be considered, while others say further costs should be included.
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There is a range of opinions on what costs should be considered Net Zero-related.
The regulator Ofgem told Full Fact it considers four policy costs to be related to environmental schemes:
But it also noted two costs that fall under the ‘wholesale costs’ portion of energy bills, which it described as “costs associated with wholesale markets, but [which] may also contribute to Net Zero policy objectives”. These are:
Contracts for Difference can either increase bills, or reduce them, depending on the wholesale price of electricity. So it’s not necessarily always the case that this represents an additional cost to consumers.
Some have suggested estimates of Net Zero’s impact on bills should include a narrower set of costs than those Ofgem highlighted to us, however.
For example, the climate policy website Carbon Brief told us it categorises environmental policy costs and Contracts for Difference as ‘green levies’, but unlike Ofgem it does not include the ECO, which helps fund upgrades to homes with poor energy efficiency, or the Capacity Market.
And the not-for-profit organisation Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) similarly told Full Fact that the ECO is primarily designed to reduce fuel poverty, and that it does not consider the Capacity Market to be an explicitly Net Zero-related cost.
The energy charity NESTA also lists the ECO as a social policy scheme rather than an environmental one.
We have asked Ofgem for more detail on how it identified the costs it says may be associated with Net Zero, but we recognise that it is difficult to give an exact answer when different costs overlap.
Our analysis of Ofgem’s figures shows that all of the costs it said could be described as associated with Net Zero, combined, account for 12% of the current overall energy price cap for a typical household paying by direct debit, up from around 11% under the previous two price caps (January to March 2025 and April to June 2025).
The figures show that costs Ofgem says may be considered Net Zero-related accounted for approximately 12% of the £111 increase in the overall energy price cap in April 2025, which the Facebook post appears to reference. The energy price cap subsequently decreased by £129 in July 2025, though Net Zero-related costs increased by £1.
A spokesperson for the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero told Full Fact: “Around 80% of the April price cap increase was driven by the rise in wholesale prices on international markets.”
A higher proportion of electricity-only bills are accounted for by Net Zero-related costs than for a dual fuel bill.
Our analysis of Ofgem’s figures shows that approximately 20% of a typical household’s electricity-only bill is accounted for by the costs it says can be considered Net Zero related—up from around 19% under the previous two electricity-only price caps.
These costs accounted for approximately 32% of the increase to a typical household’s electricity-only bill in April. The electricity-only price cap subsequently decreased by £44 in July, though Net Zero-related costs increased by £1.
Again though, whether these figures accurately reflect the impact of Net Zero on bills may be disputed by those who think a different set of costs should be counted.
For example, based on its own definition, Carbon Brief calculates that 15% of an electricity bill is accounted for by ‘green levies’.
It’s worth noting some other costs included in energy bills, aside from those mentioned above, are sometimes described as Net Zero costs.
For example, network costs, which cover the cost of building and maintaining the overall network and ‘grid balancing’ (ensuring supply meets demand), are related to both renewable and non-renewable energy production. The extent to which these costs should be considered Net Zero-related is the subject of debate.
Some have suggested that these costs are much higher due to the shift to renewables than they would otherwise have been. However the ECIU and Carbon Brief both told Full Fact that they do not believe these costs should be wholly attributed to Net Zero policies, as they also cover non-renewable energy sources (for example, while network costs are used to pay for renewables installations, they also pay for things like gas pipes, and general network upgrades).
Others have argued that the direct wholesale cost of electricity is inflated by other costs to suppliers related to Net Zero, including the Climate Change Levy and the UK Emissions Trading Scheme. In particular one paper published by the climate-sceptic charity the Global Warming Policy Foundation in June 2025—several months after the Facebook post we’re looking at here was published—suggested the proportion of domestic electricity bills accounted for by Net Zero costs could be around 25% if these costs, which it referred to as “carbon taxes”, are factored in.
Ofgem did not include these costs when we asked what it considers to be Net Zero-related. Nor did most—though not all—experts we consulted. The regulator said some network costs associated with decarbonisation were clearly passed onto consumers, but it was difficult to quantify exactly how much is attributed directly to Net Zero.
The main driver for increasing network capacity, for example, may be Net Zero-related connections, but it is certainly not the only one.
It’s worth noting that the figures discussed in this article refer to domestic energy bills—there are other environmental policy costs that apply to businesses.
Correction 8 August 2025
An earlier version of this article failed to consider some of the costs which may be associated with Net Zero, and focused only on environmental and social policy costs. We’ve now corrected this, updating our analysis with new figures from Ofgem and others.
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as false our analysis of Ofgem figures suggests this is too high.
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