The catalog is a compilation of state and local energy efficiency potential studies to serve as a resource for energy planners and as a baseline for future analyses.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on best practices on upgrades for zero energy ready homes. Speakers include  Florida Solar Energy Center and BIRAenergy.

This report is a guide to all customer-facing financing products—products offered by a lender directly to a borrower—used to pay for energy efficiency. Intended for state and local governments that are deciding whether to start a new program, tune up and existing program, or create a Green Bank, it provides information on the full range of financing product options for target participants, the tradeoffs of various products, and potential advantages and disadvantages for different types of customers.

This document features lessons learned shared by Better Buildings Residential Network members during Peer Exchange Calls held during Autumn 2016.

Energy burden is the percentage of household income spent on home energy bills. In this report, ACEEE, along with the Energy Efficiency for All coalition, measures the energy burden of households in 48 of the largest American cities. The report finds that low-income, African-American, Latino, low-income multifamily, and renter households all spend a greater proportion of their income on utilities than the average family. The report also identifies energy efficiency as an underutilized strategy that can help reduce high energy burdens by as much as 30%. Given this potential, the report goes on to describe policies and programs to ramp up energy efficiency investments in low-income and underserved communities.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on employer assisted initiatives and the range of models used to help employees become energy efficient at home. It included lessons learned from the Clinton Climate Initiative, Vermont Energy Investment Corporation's (VEIC) employee sustainability benefit program, and the Nevada Governor's Office of Energy.

This Guide is designed to help state and local policymakers to take full advantage of new policy developments by providing them with a comprehensive set of tools to support launching or accelerating residential energy efficiency programs. The Guide focuses on four categories of policies that have proven particularly effective in providing a framework within which residential energy efficiency programs can thrive: incentives and financing, making the value of energy efficiency visible in the real estate market, data access and standardization, and supporting utility system procurement of energy efficiency.

The Better Buildings Residential Network Social Media toolkit can be used to help residential energy efficiency programs learn to engage potential customers through social media. Social media can build brand awareness concerning home energy upgrades and the entities working on them, which can lead to more energy upgrade projects taking place in the long run. This toolkit will help program managers and their staff with decisions like what social media works best for various program needs. When aligned with other marketing and outreach efforts, social media can be a useful tool in attracting home energy upgrade customers. Note that social media changes constantly, so users of this toolkit need to regularly reassess their methods and review results to ensure goals are being met.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on innovative financing approaches programs are using to support residential energy efficiency.

Among the many benefits ascribed to energy efficiency is the fact that it can help create jobs. Although this is often used to motivate investments in efficiency programs, verifying job creation benefits is more complicated than it might seem at first. This paper identifies some of the issues that contribute to a lack of consistency in attempts to verify efficiency-related job creation. It then proposes an analytically rigorous and tractable framework for program evaluators to use in future assessments.

This presentation covers lesson learned for PACE from the Toledo Port Authority, innovative real estate finance solutions from the Ygrene Energy Fund, and financing energy improvements on utility bills.

Bill insert used by JEA to advertise their energy efficiency program.

This webcast discusses the background for U.S. Department of Energy’s Smart Grid Investment Grant (SGIG) consumer behavior study effort; the various utilities who are participating and what they each plan to include their respective studies; the quantitative results and qualitative lessons learned thus far from these studies; and the types of research will be undertaken by LBNL over the next several years.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on new and updated revenue strategies.

This report presents the impact evaluation conducted of the 13 programs in the Southeast Consortium Better Buildings Neighborhood Program (BBNP).

This report presents the phase 1 process evaluation conducted of the 13 programs in the Southeast Consortium Better Buildings Neighborhood Program (BBNP).

This report presents the phase 2 process evaluation conducted of the 13 programs in the Southeast Consortium Better Buildings Neighborhood Program (BBNP).

This report provides an independent analysis of the economic performance of SEEA's 13-city, U.S. Department of Energy-funded energy efficiency upgrade consortium from 2010 to 2013. It estimates the net impacts of SEEA's energy efficiency programs on the economy of the southeast region as a whole, and on the economies of the states with participating programs.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on how to market energy efficiency as a socially responsible investment. 

This presentation describes JEA's program and lessons learned about designing custom messages for specific markets.

Case study highlighting the home performance lending program spearheaded by local utility JEA and JaxMetro Credit Union in Jacksonville, Florida. This program is one of the most successful in the Southeast Energy Efficiency Alliance's Community Consortium.

This market assessment for the Sarasota County (Florida) Energy Efficiency Upgrade Financing Program identifies the customers and potential demand for an energy efficiency upgrade financing program.

Find out how JEA successfully increased interest in its low-interest loan program beyond a short-term incentive.

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 webcast offers information on successful marketing strategies, as well as design considerations and market research insights for creating and marketing successful projects in specific neighborhoods.

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

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.

This report presents best practices for operating successful portfolio-level efficiency programs, including assessing efficiency potential, cost-effectiveness screening, and developing a portfolio of approaches.

This report provides an overview of evaluation, measurement, and verification approaches used to estimate the load impacts and effectiveness of energy efficiency programs.

This report presents a review of selected home energy auditing tools. The energy audit tools reviewed in this study include REM/Rate, BEACON Home Energy Advisor, EnergyInsights, Home Energy Tune-uP, EnergyGauge, TREAT, the National Energy Audit Tool (NEAT), Home Energy Saver Professional (HESPro), and RealHomeAnalyzer.

This report summarizes the issues and approaches involved in motivating customers to reduce the total energy they consume through energy prices and rate design.