This 90-minute webinar explored the topic of linking and leveraging energy efficiency and renewable energy (EE/RE) programs for limited-income households, including the need to coordinate with other energy assistance programs. It presented case studies of organizations that have successfully advanced connections among available programs and funding sources.
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This toolkit describes how to strengthen residential energy efficiency program outreach and marketing efforts through data-driven, tailored efforts to change behaviors. One of the greatest challenges facing the residential energy efficiency market is motivating people to take steps to save energy. This toolkit provides guidance, resources, and examples for applying community-based social marketing (CBSM) to increase the number of homes that are energy efficient.
The Energy Efficiency Learning Center offers a selection of trainings and resources to enhance participation in utility energy efficiency programs. It allows users to undertake trainings on the latest home performance standards and best practices on their own schedule.
This report consists of a literature review and in-depth interviews with subject matter experts in the Home Performance with ENERGY STAR (HPwES) program area. The goal was to compare Delaware Sustainable Energy Utility (DESEU) HPwES Programs with peer-programs across the United States. The report also identifies key metrics and emerging trends regarding program design.
On Efficiency Maine’s "Find a Residential Registered Vendor" locator on its website, customers can see the services each contractor offers, sort the list by distance from the homeowner, and differentiate contractors based on number of projects completed and customer satisfaction. All contractors are added to the list when they meet the program's requirements.
This document profiles the Chicago-area non-profit Elevate Energy, which offers a full-service energy efficiency retrofit program for owners of and tenants in affordable multifamily buildings in eleven states.
This presentation provides an overview of energy efficiency financing for low- and moderate-income households, including a sector overview, consumer protections, financing products, and lessons learned.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on key challenges and opportunities to deploy neighborhood energy programs. Speakers include the City of Orlando, SEEDS, and Research Into Action, Inc.
This report updates ACEEE's 2013 assessment of multifamily energy efficiency programs in US metropolitan areas with the most multifamily households. Using housing, policy, and utility-sector data from 2014 and 2015, this report documents how these programs have changed in the context of dynamic housing markets and statewide policy environments. The report also offers an analysis of the number, spending, offerings, and targeted participants of current programs and their potential for further expansion.
This report examines the history of pay-for-performance (P4P) energy efficiency approaches. As the report describes, there is a diverse spectrum of pay-for-performance programs but, at the most basic level, these programs track and reward energy savings as they occur, usually by examining data from a building's energy meters -- as opposed to the more common approach of estimating savings in advance of installation and offering upfront rebates or incentives in a lump-sum payment. The report finds that P4P has some important opportunities for increasing energy savings, but also key limitations that will need to be better understood through piloting and experimentation.
Residential Property Assessed Clean Energy (R-PACE) -- A Primer for State and Local Energy Officials
This presentation introduces the Energy Programs Consortium report, Residential Property Assessed Clean Energy (R-PACE) - A Primer for State and Local Energy Officials. It also covers R-PACE statistics, program details, comparisons with other financing options, and consumer protections.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on how recent policy changes have impacted residential energy efficiency program implementation. Speakers include Efficiency Maine, Michigan Environmental Council, and Groundwork Center for Resilient Communities.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on key challenges and opportunities to deploy interactive engagement strategies including customer segmentation, loyalty and reward programs, and gamification. It features speakers from Fiveworx, ICF International, and Cool Choices.
This webcast highlight effective efforts by state and local agencies, non-profits, and utilities to bring energy efficiency and renewable energy (EE/RE) to low-income households.
This report details opportunities for scaling up program activity and increasing savings from programs reaching the people who need it most. It discussed best practices from existing programs for overcoming many of the key challenges that program administrators face, including how to address housing deficiencies that prevent energy efficiency upgrades, how to address cost effectiveness challenges, and how to serve hard-to-reach households.
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 summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on communicating non-energy benefits that homeowners and building owners are most interested in. Speakers include Elevate Energy, Green & Healthy Homes Initiative, and Skumatz Economic Research Associates, Inc.
The report, based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and a survey of tens of thousands of businesses across the country, provides detailed breakdowns of clean energy jobs not available previously, and it was developed and released in connection with a major U.S. Department of Energy study of all energy jobs in America.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on approaches organizations can use for moving homeowners from HVAC or other individual improvements to whole home upgrades and encouraging homeowners to undertake upgrades over time.
This report discusses indoor air quality issues, including: wildfire smoke, dampness, and mold, and the effect of energy efficiency upgrades on these health-related issues. The report describes current state policies and programs in these areas, highlighting approaches for consideration by other jurisdictions.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on quality assurance of energy efficiency services.
This publication summarizes lessons learned from Peer Exchange Calls about how energy efficiency programs and partners can leverage timing to engage homeowners.
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.
Lists a number of resources related to Michigan Saves, including contractor application, home energy loan implementation guide, and training presentations for residential contractors.
This report was developed to help inform national stakeholders about the strategies that have been used to achieve deep energy savings in the multifamily housing sector through energy efficiency upgrades. These strategies could be used as models in areas where utility program administrators and policymakers seek to achieve deep energy savings in the multifamily building stock for the purposes of reducing energy costs, creating comfortable and healthy homes, meeting regulatory requirements, or reducing the environmental impacts of energy consumption. This report includes a national multifamily market characterization, barriers and opportunities for program and policy efforts, and eight exemplary case studies from across the country.
This presentation explains non-energy benefits from residential energy efficiency programs, including those associated with households, ratepayer or taxpayers, and societal benefits. Also presented is a framework for measurement and monetization of health benefits, economic benefits, and environmental benefits (e.g. avoided emissions) and a case study of New Jersey's Clean Energy Program.
Residential air-source heat pumps (ASHP) are a heating and air-conditioning technology that use electricity to provide a combination of space heating and cooling to homes. A new generation of ASHPs has come to market over the past five years. This report evaluates the key market barriers as well as potential opportunities to leverage. Based on an assessment of the regional ASHP market, it is clear that while ASHPs have established a viable and growing market, there remains a significant opportunity to further accelerate adoption of the technology and in the process achieve energy and cost savings to the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic region.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on strategies that can be used to promote energy efficiency programs for manufactured homes. Speakers include Collaborative Efficiency, Wisconsin Energy Conservation Corporation, and East Kentucky Power Cooperative.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on integrating health and home performance and discussed connecting energy efficiency and health.
Better Buildings Energy Data Accelerator (BBEDA) partners Salt Lake City, the investor-owned electric utility Rocky Mountain Power (RMP), and the investor-owned natural gas utility Questar worked with community stakeholders throughout 2014 and 2015 to design and implement a data access solution. As a result, RMP created a data access portal for its customers in 2016, and Questar is working toward a data access solution that will be operational by 2017.
This guide for states highlights energy efficiency as a least-cost strategy to meet air pollution reduction and other policy objectives, including energy affordability and reliability. It presents established policy and program “pathways” to advance demand-side energy efficiency.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on strategies for scaling up and growing residential energy efficiency programs or contracting businesses. It covered PG&E's Residential Energy Efficiency Program's Pay for Performance (P4P) program. It also covered priority areas to consider when scaling up a program, such as contractor sales and marketing training and maintaining quality.
This report represents NEEP’s annual assessment of the major policy developments of 2014, as well as its look into the immediate future, where NEEP gauge states’ progress toward capturing cost-effective energy efficiency as a first-order resource. While looking at the region as a whole, NEEP also provides summary and analysis of some of the biggest building energy efficiency successes and setbacks from Maine to Maryland — including significant energy efficiency legislation and regulations and changes in funding levels for energy efficiency programs.
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.
Better Together: Linking and Leveraging Energy Programs for Low-Income Households
This presentation includes a series of case studies to highlight effective efforts by state and local agencies, non-profits, and utilities to bring energy efficiency and renewable energy (EE/RE) to low-income households. It explores the topic of linking and leveraging EE/RE programs for limited-income households, including the need to coordinate with other energy assistance programs.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on how to market energy efficiency upgrades through affiliate partners and other established institutions.
The Guide to Action provides in-depth information about over a dozen policies and programs that states are using to meet their energy, environmental, and economic objectives with energy efficiency, renewable energy, and combined heat and power. Each policy description is based on states’ experiences in designing and implementing policies, as documented in existing literature and shared through peer-exchange opportunities provided to states by EPA’s State Climate and Energy Program.
Energy efficiency collaboratives vary greatly and are typically designed for a specific jurisdiction, making them hard to compare side by side. This guide seeks to highlight a few common elements and draw conclusions on the overall effectiveness of specific characteristics of collaboratives. This guide defines and examines four different types of collaboratives in terms of their origin, scope, decision-making method, membership, duration, available resources, and how they interact with and influence their respective commissions.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on how to market energy efficiency upgrades in the multifamily housing sector.
This guide was developed for local climate and clean energy (i.e., energy efficiency, renewable energy, and combined heat and power) program implementers to help create or transition to program designs that are viable over the long term. The guide draws on the experience and examples of EPA’s Climate Showcase Communities as they developed innovative models for programs that could be financially viable over the long term and replicated in other communities.
A number of states are beginning to recognize Demand Reduction Induced Price Effects (DRIPE) as a real, quantifiable benefit of energy efficiency and demand response programs. DRIPE is a measurement of the value of demand reductions in terms of the decrease in wholesale energy prices, resulting in lower total expenditures on electricity or natural gas across a given grid. This paper reviews the existing knowledge and experience from select U.S. states regarding DRIPE (including New York and Ohio), and the potential for expanded application of the concept of DRIPE by regulators.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on changing an organization's home performance business model and expanding the services offered.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on types of incentives.
This U.S. Department of Energy Focus Series highlights the BetterBuildings for Michigan program’s community readiness assessment tool.
This form is used to itemize energy conservation measures as an eligibility requirement under Efficiency Maine's Home Energy Savings Program.
There are more than 17 million multifamily households nationwide, yet they remain a significant and mostly untapped opportunity for energy efficiency gains. Many cities and states that have embraced energy retrofitting as a job creator and boon to both the environment and economy have yet to address potential savings in multifamily properties, primarily because of obstacles not faced by single family and commercial properties. This paper discusses two barriers -- a lack of information and financing -- that stand in the way of multifamily energy retrofits.
This report provides an overview of the current state of on-bill programs and provides actionable insights on key program design considerations for on-bill lending programs.
Insights from Efficiency Maine related to Workforce Development.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on choosing and developing program evaluation.
This presentation provides an overview of New Jersey Clean Energy's approach to contractor engagement, including contractor participation requirements, procedures for quality assurance and quality control, production incentives, training procedures, and an online contractor portal.
Overview and Preliminary Results of ARRA-Funded SGIG Consumer Behavior Studies
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 how loan performance data is tracked and analyzed, and what the data shows.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on the benefits of community assessments and strategies for gathering information.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on shared funding arrangements with contractors.
Efficiency Maine developed this online portal, where many of its program forms are available for download (e.g., program overviews and manuals, participation agreements, and related application materials).
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on gathering and communicating loan performance data.
This peer exchange call summary focused on moving from assessments to upgrades in multifamily buildings.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on the features and eligibility of the PowerSaver Loan Program.
This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on the challenges, strategies and advantages of operating as a prime contractor.
This presentation provides an overview of PSE&G's Multifamily Housing Program, highlighting drivers, incentive structure, results, and lessons learned.
This peer exchange call summary focused on strategies, opportunities and focuses on shared space and technology in multi-family buildings and in-unit upgrades.
In this video interview segment, Mary Templeton with BetterBuildings for Michigan discusses developing a readiness scale to determine if target audiences are ready to hear a program’s messages and take advantage of its offerings.
This peer exchange call summary focused on the relationship between contract pricing and customers.
This peer exchange call summary focused on sales training assistance programs for contractors.
Presentation on how Michigan Saves realigned its incentives to encourage more projects with significant energy savings potential.
Efficiency Maine created a code of conduct for contractors to follow when working in homes. The code is available for download on the Efficiency Maine website, and dictates guidelines for respecting homeowners' property and communicating with the homeowner about appropriate information. Users on the Efficiency Maine website can search a list of vendors that have agreed to follow the code.
This video explains how Efficiency Maine helped contractors gain sales and business skills through training, which helped the program improve assessment-to-upgrade conversion rates and homeowner satisfaction.
This toolkit provides information about including and using relevant green data fields in the MLS. This information can help buyers quickly find green homes; make it easy to promote the special features of a green home; and support comparisons when it is time to appraise a green home.
This video explains how Better Buildings for Michigan's performance metrics and quality assurance enabled them to encourage high-performing contractors, to help underperforming contractors improve, and ultimately to dismiss some contractors.
Keeping Up With Your Audience, So They Keep Up With Your Program
This video provides an overview of Better Buildings for Michigan's mentoring program for contractors, and the high value that contractors and the program gain from mentoring.
An example of a detailed and thorough implementation guide written for the Michigan Saves program.
This peer exchange call summary focused on the advantages, challenges, creation and management of regional networks.
This peer exchange call summary focused on how programs are devising plans for creating a contractor revenue stream and potential fee structures.
This case study explains how Efficiency Maine provided contractor sales training to boost upgrade conversions.
This case study discusses BetterBuildings for Michigan's targeted outreach campaigns which applied varying incentives and outreach strategies to neighborhoods with a goal to understand which rebates and strategies work best in the target communities.
This peer exchange call summary focused on the challenges and strategies for marketing commercial financial products and attracting financial institutions.
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.
Contractor Sales Training: Providing the Skills Necessary to Sell Comprehensive Home Energy Upgrades
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.
Engaging Financial Institution Partners
Leveraging Partnerships with Faith-Based Organizations
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 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.
This report presents the results of a scoping study to assess the need for national databases that can support best practices in energy efficiency program evaluation, measurement, and verification (EM&V).
This report helps policymakers understand how electric and natural gas utilities can achieve greater efficiency by establishing numeric energy savings targets and goals for energy efficiency programs.
This report describes how utility planning processes that allow demand-side resources to compete with supply-side resources can promote cost-effective energy efficiency.