Homeowners face higher energy bills to pay for greener gas that could be used to heat just 10 per cent of the country’s homes.

       The Government will announce on Tuesday that it wants a subsidy scheme to help fund its ambition to produce 5 gigawatts of hydrogen for use in heavy industry, transport and home heating by 2030.

       The scheme will be modelled on subsidies that were key to boosting the UK’s offshore wind industry over the past decade, which are levied on electricity bills.

       The plans could see bills rise for everyone, although hydrogen is likely to play only a niche role in meeting the Government’s targets to cut the carbon emissions produced by home heating. Alternative plans could see costs added to general taxation.

       The Government expects hydrogen to provide enough energy for 67,000 homes, or 0.2 per cent, by 2030, rising to meet up to 10 per cent of domestic heating demand by 2035.

       Experts on Monday said there was a risk that bill payers could be locked into paying for the development of “pointless” technology.

       The cost of making homes energy efficient

       The Government is currently carrying out trials to prove the efficacy and safety of hydrogen as a like-for-like replacement for gas boilers and said it would make a decision by 2026.

       But it warned in its hydrogen strategy against “delaying action” to decarbonise home heating, suggesting that proven technologies such as heat pumps should be used instead in the immediate future.

       Hydrogen can be made either using methane, with the emissions captured and stored, classed as “blue”, or through electrolysis, considered “green” if renewable electricity is used.

       It is likely to be in high demand in industries that will struggle to decarbonise through electrification, such as shipping, steel manufacturing and fertiliser use, and the use of hydrogen for home heating is expected to be concentrated near industrial clusters.

       Juliet Phillips, an energy expert at think tank E3G, said: “The risk is that gas payers end up paying for what’s used in a few industrial clusters. That doesn’t seem very fair or progressive.”