The SEAI Better Energy Homes attic insulation grant: eligibility, checks and paperwork

How much the grant pays

The amount is fixed by house type. Nothing is costed at application; the grant is capped later by what you actually spend, so if the eligible work costs less than the grant, you receive the lower figure.

A qualifying welfare applicant, or a qualifying first-time buyer of an existing home bought on or after 1 January 2025, may receive a higher band (detached €2,500, semi-detached or end of terrace €1,900, mid-terrace €1,800, apartment €1,400), subject to SEAI verification. The standard post-works Building Energy Rating (BER) grant is €50 and is paid only on the home's first grant application; for a homeowner receiving a qualifying welfare payment the higher BER amount is €280, subject to SEAI verification.

For cost context: across upgrades completed in 2025, SEAI reports median attic insulation costs of €2,519 for a detached house, €2,000 for semi-detached or end of terrace, €2,000 for mid-terrace and €1,894 for an apartment. Those are 2025 figures from claims as paid, not quotes.

Sources: SEAI Homeowner Application Guide, pp. 4–5 · SEAI, median costs of individual energy upgrades, 2025

Who qualifies

• The home must have been built and occupied before 2011.
• Previous attic-grant support is checked against the property, not the current owner. If an SEAI attic insulation grant was ever paid for your home's Meter Point Reference Number (MPRN, the meter number on the electricity bill), a new attic application is blocked, even if that grant went to a previous owner. Check before you plan around the money.
• Existing insulation is not the same as an earlier grant. Attic insulation that was never grant-aided can be topped up under the grant, as long as the existing insulation and the top-up are recorded on the Declaration of Works.
• Apartments qualify only where heat escapes through the apartment's own roof. Another apartment directly above you means the measure does not apply.
• The owner applies. A private owner can live in the home or rent it out; a tenant cannot apply.
• Do not buy materials or start work before you have applied, been approved and accepted the offer. Work started out of sequence can lose eligibility.
• After the works, a registered BER assessor must assess the home and the new BER must be published on SEAI's register before the claim can be completed.

Source: SEAI Homeowner Application Guide, pp. 4 and 15–19

The standard the work must meet

SEAI's technical standard, the Domestic Technical Standards and Specifications (DTSS) version 4.0, sets the targets the contractor must reach:

• Insulation at ceiling level: a roof U-value of 0.16 W/m²K or better. As a guide, that typically means around 300 mm of mineral-wool type insulation, or around 150 mm of rigid polyisocyanurate (PIR) board; the contractor must calculate the actual U-value from the materials used, before and after, and enter both on the Declaration of Works. If the required U-value is not achieved, the grant cannot be paid.
• Insulation at rafter level (a "cold pitched roof"): a U-value of 0.20 W/m²K or better, with ventilation kept open at both the eaves and the ridge.
• Ventilation stays open. Ceiling-level insulation must leave the eaves airflow path clear, and any bathroom or kitchen extract fan ducted through the attic must terminate outside the roof, not into the attic.
• Spray foam needs its certificate. Only a product with an Irish Agrément certificate (or accepted equivalent) is allowed, installed exactly as the certificate describes, and the certificate goes into your records.

Source: SEAI Domestic Technical Standards and Specifications v4.0, clause 6.4 and clause 6.5

Checks you can make before signing

None of these makes you a certifier; they are things you can see, or ask the contractor to show you, before the Declaration of Works is signed. SEAI's inspection checklist assigns these defects severity ratings, and every published severity requires rework; if SEAI finds an issue during a pre-payment inspection, it may hold payment until the contractor rectifies it.

• Insulation covers the whole accessible heat-loss roof surface and continues over the timber wall plate at the eaves with no uninsulated strip around the edges. The only published exception is a restricted-access area of 15% or less of the total heat-loss roof area that the contractor deems economically infeasible to insulate; the applicable U-value must still be achieved, and the area and reason must be recorded on the Declaration of Works.
• The contractor shows you the installed depth with a tape, and points to the before and after U-values entered on the form.
• Every vent you can find is still open, and any extract fan duct runs to a roof tile or soffit terminal outside.
• Every pipe in the attic is insulated along its full run, including bends and joints.
• The water tank is insulated on its sides and top with no gaps. Where the underside of the tank is less than 300 mm above the finished ceiling insulation, no insulation is laid below it; where it is more than 300 mm above, insulation is also installed below the tank and on its underside.
• A supported walkway runs from the hatch to anything that needs maintenance, like the tank.
• Recessed lights have suitable covers or are kept 75 mm clear of the insulation, and high-powered electrical cables sit on top of the insulation or have 75 mm clearance on each side for their full attic run.
• The hatch itself is insulated and draught-stripped.
• You hold the insulation guarantee, and the spray-foam certificate if spray foam was used. An inspector can ask you to produce both.

Source: SEAI Better Energy Homes QADP v5.14, roof inspection checklist, p. 40 and severity definitions, p. 7

The paperwork

For a standard online application, SEAI asks for the property's MPRN, house type, year built and registered-contractor details, and says the application should be approved within minutes. The real paperwork arrives by post with the Letter of Offer as a personalised pack. An attic claim hands back three completed forms together:

• The attic insulation Declaration of Works: the roof form SEAI published as a worked example in September 2023 has fields for the cost, roof types treated, before and after coverage, depths and calculated U-values, the area insulated and any spray-foam product and certificate. SEAI publishes no current blank attic form, so go by the fields on your issued personalised form. The contractor's nominated person signs it, then you sign after reviewing it.
• The post-works BER Declaration of Works: the contractor fills in the pre-works data section without signing, the assessor completes and signs the results section, and you sign last.
• The Request for Payment: yours alone, signed twice, with the bank details the grant is paid into.

Three attic-specific details need checking:

• Partial coverage must be surveyed and explained. The contractor surveys all heat-loss roof areas first. A restricted-access area may be left uninsulated only where extensive and expensive work would be required and it is 15% or less of the total heat-loss roof area; anything larger must be insulated to the DTSS standard. If less than 100% of a roof type is insulated, the percentage, area and reason go in the Comment box or an attached sheet.
• A top-up must be recorded, with the existing insulation's details. Imprecise top-up detail is a documented cause of returned claims.
• The assessor needs proper purchase evidence. Give the BER assessor an invoice or receipt showing the dwelling address, installation date, and insulation make and type; thickness and area may also need to be established by inspection. If the evidence is insufficient, the assessor must use conservative defaults and the new BER may not reflect the upgrade.

Sources: SEAI Homeowner Application Guide, pp. 15–21 · SEAI Roof Insulation Quality Alert, pp. 2–3 · SEAI roof insulation economic feasibility bulletin, April 2025, pp. 5–6 · SEAI Contractor Code of Practice v1.19, p. 14

How an inspection can affect payment

SEAI inspects a sample of grant-aided work, before or after payment, and the Declaration of Works is the record the inspection is checked against. The latest detailed official Better Energy Homes outturn is for 2022 and is not attic-specific: 18% of Better Energy Homes properties were inspected and 54% passed initially, and the Comptroller and Auditor General says the inspections were targeted and probably not representative of works overall. Every issue found requires rework by the contractor, and a pre-payment inspection can hold the grant until SEAI confirms the fixes.

Source: Comptroller and Auditor General, 2022 report, chapter 8, Fig. 8.7