This peer exchange call summary focused on how programs are devising plans for creating a contractor revenue stream and potential fee structures.

This mid-program evaluation includes extensive analysis of program sectors, including results of surveys of participants, and summarizes lessons learned to date.

This handbook is intended to assist electric utilities in overcoming barriers to using social media; provide a clear and simple stepwise approach to get started or enhance social media use; and provide a set of recommendations for using social media as an additional marketing tool to drive participation in energy efficiency and demand management programs.

These standard work specifications define minimum requirements for upgrade work and can be used as an industry guide for workers, training instructors, and program administrators involved in the home performance industry.

This peer exchange call summary focused on timing program demand with seasonal fluctuation (e.g., contractor schedules, seasonal lulls).

This peer exchange call summary focused on strategies and challenges of getting household energy data.

This peer exchange call summary focused on the challenges and strategies for marketing commercial financial products and attracting financial institutions.

This peer exchange call summary focused on strategies and challenges of working with rental property owners and tenants on multifamily upgrades.

This peer exchange call summary focused on activities to streamline service delivery to customers.

This presentation highlights research from U.S. Green Data showing that it is important to pique consumers' interest with incentives, but that their effectiveness can be maximized by making them simple, focusing on people "ready to purchase," and educating consumers about the value of energy efficiency.

Presentation summarizing the important elements needed to induce and sustain contractor participation in home performance programs.

This is the first study to provide statistical evidence that, holding other factors constant, a green label on a single-family home in California provides a market premium compared to a comparable home without the label. The research also indicates that the price premium is influenced by local climate and environmental ideology. To reach these conclusions, researchers conducted an economic analysis of 1.6 million homes sold in California between 2007 and 2012, controlling for other variables known to influence home prices in order to isolate the added value of green home labels.

This paper explores the drivers of energy use behaviors and the behavior‐based programs adopted by utilities charged with reducing the energy consumption of their residential and small commercial customers. It also presents researchable recommendations on how utilities can improve the effectiveness of behavior‐based energy programs.

This paper establishes the size of the potential retrofit market in the United States, and examines the emergence of new financing models that offer the promise of overcoming historical barriers to energy efficiency.

This peer exchange call summary focused on leveraging effective partnerships for multi-family and low-income outreach and service delivery.

This article and recruiting presentation highlights reasons why it makes sense for an HVAC contractor to move into home performance, and provides program staff with key touch points to consider in considering potential contractor partners.

This peer exchange call summary focused on assisting contractors with working capital and the coordination of financing strategies.

This peer exchange call summary focused on strategies, challenges and opportunities in working with condominium owners and associations.

This peer exchange call summary focused on the strategies, challenges and key interaction points with the real estate sector.

This report provides policymakers with principles and recommendations to understand and manage concerns about bill and rate impacts resulting from requiring utilities to provide efficiency programs.

This resource is intended to help state energy, environmental, and policy makers identify and quantify the many benefits of clean energy to support the development and implementation of cost-effective clean energy initiatives. It also identified the multiple benefits of clean energy and explains why they should be quantified and considered along with costs.

This presentation includes the brands, website addresses, and images for most of the Better Buildings Neighborhood Program partners.

These BetterBuildings for Michigan mailers show satisfied program customers claiming they have the power to make changes and bring results by increasing the efficiency of their homes.

This research report and slides provide a detailed segmentation of the building energy upgrade market and summarize market research on each segment. Market segments include single-family homes, multi-family homes, and several types of commercial and institutional buildings.

This U.S. Environmental Protection Agency resource is intended to help state and local governments design finance programs for their jurisdiction. It describes financing program options, key components of these programs, and factors to consider as they make decisions about getting started or updating their programs.

This data intake template spreadsheet provides a way to track home energy performance metrics.

This peer exchange call summary focused on a general overview and implementation plan of the PACE program.

Survey for Minnesota home owners participating in Community Energy Services pilot program about their experience at their home visit.

Authorization form to obtain household energy information.

This guide from Boulder County's EnergySmart service is an example of expectations and guidelines for contractor operations.

This presentation describes strategies for outreach to energy contractors and auditors, including contractor incentives.

This Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Clean Energy Policy Brief describes how adding sales skills to contractors' existing technical expertise helps convert more assessments into comprehensive home energy upgrades. It profiles Efficiency Maine's contractor sales training and includes a list of resources.

This document provides an overview of how state policymakers, utilities, and regulators can overcome barriers to deploying customer energy information and feedback strategies.

This peer exchange call summary focused on how to gather data for evaluation and reporting.

This peer exchange call summary focused on aggregating, reporting and evaluating information.

This report provides state and local policymakers with information on successful approaches to the design and implementation of residential efficiency programs for households ineligible for low-income programs.

This peer exchange call summary focused on the challenges, advantages and keys of working with partners to obtain and maintain an effective workforce.

Describes program guidelines for EmPower Louisiana's Home Energy Rebate Option (HERO)-Existing Homes Program. Provides guidance to participants on how the EmPower Louisiana HERO Program will be implemented, and provides details on all aspects of the application and reporting process.

This report describes different approaches to energy efficiency finance taken by utilities.

Local governments can promote energy efficiency in their jurisdictions by developing and implementing strategies that improve the efficiency of municipal facilities and operations and/or encourage energy efficiency improvements in residential, commercial, and industrial sectors. The energy efficiency guides in this series describe the process of developing and implementing strategies, using real-world examples, for improving energy efficiency in local government operations (see the guides on local government operations, K-12 schools, energy-efficient product procurement, combined heat and power, and water and wastewater facilities), as well as in the community.

Presentation explaining the advantages and challenges of electric cooperatives, and discussing the implementation of an energy efficiency program operated by an electric cooperative in South Carolina.

This marketing plan from EnergyWorks Kansas City includes a strategic focus for the program's outreach activities, as well as three core marketing objectives Kansas City set out to meet.

This lease agreement is an example of an equipment lease from the Fayette County equipment loan program for contractors.

Fayette County, Pennsylvania completed a county-wide housing market analysis in 2005. The Fayette County Better Buildings program used information contained in the analysis to help inform its program design. For example, the program drew on information about the county's "patch" communities, which are towns constructed in the early 1900s by coal companies to house workers--to ensure that the program would address the unique conditions within these communities.

This peer exchange call summary focused on establishing the strategies, challenges and key topics related to financing for future peer exchange calls.

Provides a framework for designing a financial program that accounts for market needs and barriers to success.

Survey for consultants participating in Green Madison and Me2 programs about their experiences with the programs.

Questionnaire for contractors participating in the Green Madison program about their overall experience, level of participation, training, and available resources.

These protocols provide recommended minimum specifications and best practices for protection of occupant health associated with home energy upgrades.

This presentation describes steps programs can take to obtain useful feedback from customers regarding their programs.

This presentation introduces new users to ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager and how to get started with benchmarking.

This report provides data from nationwide utility customer satisfaction surveys and two case studies to encourage utilities to offer high-quality energy efficiency programs and services for their customers.

Sample Request for Proposals (RFP) was issued by Lawrence Berkley National Laboratory for a process and impact evaluation for the U.S. Department of Energy's Better Buildings Neighborhood Program.

This process guide includes information on capturing comments from open-ended survey questions and generating actionable items for program improvement.

This peer exchange call summary focused on creating a dialogue between contractors, trainers and jobseekers about program design/implementation and results of workforce feedback.

Example loan loss reserve fund agreement.

This study provides statistically significant analysis that ENERGY STAR qualified new homes sell faster (i.e., fewer days on the market) and for higher prices (i.e., sell for higher prices, or sell for a greater percentage of the listing price, or have a higher price per square foot) than comparable nonqualified homes, providing valuable evidence that there is a market advantage for ENERGY STAR qualified homes.

On Maryland's Home Performance with ENERGY STAR website, homeowners can review their contractor and experience. These customer reviews, along with contractors' accreditations and services, are published on the website as part of each contractor's information page. Users of the website can search for contractors and sort the results based on homeowner ratings and by geographical location.

Example Me2 and Green Madison process evaluation plan to conduct an in-depth investigation and assessment of the major program areas.

Survey for people who signed up to participate in the Me2 program for home performance assessments, but ultimately decided not to participate. The goal of the survey is to help improve services for future participants.

Participant survey sent to Me2 customers that have completed at least the initial Energy Advocate visit.

This peer exchange call summary focused on messaging and delivery strategies of those messages to low-income program participants. 

This report identifies issues associated with developing a national evaluation, measurement, and verification (EM&V) standard for end-use, non-transportation, energy efficiency activities.

Outlines potential partnership structures for energy efficiency program administrators and financial institutions, and discusses strategies for negotiation and communication with financial partners.

This publication outlines capital leveraging models and examples from across the country in which public funds were used to influence energy loan program capital.

This report provides an overview of residential customer information and behavior efficiency programs, and identifies key challenges to and solutions for increasing the penetration of these programs nationwide.

Presentation that provides a summary of the role financing plays within energy efficiency programs.

Presentation providing an overview of the PAYS financial model, including information on risks and how to manage them, and successful program examples using the PAYS model.

This peer exchange call summary focused on the background and features of the PowerSaver loan program.

Presentation providing an overview of financing programs, a strategy for continuous improvement, tools for program management, a risk management strategy, and common risks associated with financing programs.

Example of an implementation plan developed by EnergySmart Colorado at the beginning of the implementation of its Better Buildings Neighborhood Program.

Boulder, Colorado's EnergySmart program produced a detailed implementation plan with activities, deliverables, and timelines by phase and task.

This publication includes best practices for how to create a quality assurance plan and the key components that these plans should include.

This peer exchange call summary focused on the challenges and effective combinations of quality assurance strategies.

This Washington State Department of Labor & Industries provides a short list of considerations and tips when hiring a contractor or remodeler.

This peer exchange call summary focused on the challenges and solutions to creating jobs, recruitment, training and retention of a workforce.

This document details the procedures for identifying, documenting, and responding to performance problems associated with contractors in the RePower Program in Washington. It includes example forms and a draft letter to contractors.

This report summarizes research assessing national and regional residential behavior-based energy efficiency (BBEE) programs and activities to identify best practices. The report emphasizes that a basic foundation for behavior change is providing energy consumers with feedback on their energy consumption, with customer engagement strategies and tactics employed to get customers to take action and drive greater levels of energy savings.

The Residential Retrofit Program Design Guide focuses on the key elements and design characteristics of building and maintaining a successful residential energy upgrade program. The material is presented as a guide for program design and planning from start to finish, laid out in chronological order of program development.