How Do Communities Ensure Federal Energy Programs Help Those Most in Need?

The Energy Efficiency for All (EEFA) coalition and the Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) held a briefing with EEFA partners in Ohio, Virginia, New York and California. These state leaders discussed how they are building successful campaigns to deliver energy/cost savings and healthy home environments for low-and-moderate-income (LMI) households. Speakers discussed how their state coalitions are using and leveraging federal energy services, such as the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Low-Income Housing Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), to ensure that all LMI residents have access to housing that is healthy, safe, energy efficient and affordable.

BRIEFING HIGHLIGHTS

 

Madiana Mustapha, Independent Consultant - Energy Efficiency for All, Energy Foundation (Moderator)

• Energy Efficiency for All (EEFA) works to increase energy efficiency and improve indoor and family environments in the multi-family housing sector. It blends expertise in affordable housing, health, energy efficiency, and home ownership to ensure efficiency programs are available to all who need them.
• One fourth of all households and two-thirds of low-income households live with high energy burdens (energy bills that are 30% or more of their income). Low-income households experience those burdens almost three times more than other households.

 

Dave Rinebolt, Executive Director & Counsel, Ohio Partners for Affordable Energy; former Program Director, U.S. Department of Energy Weatherization Assistance Program

• The Department of Energy (DOE) plays a critical role in establishing the framework for high quality weatherization.
• There are four typical weatherization measures: mechanical (e.g., heating and cooling systems), health and safety (e.g., ventilation systems), building shells (e.g., insulation), and electric baseload (e.g., lights and appliances). Mechanical upgrades are often paid for by utility energy assistance programs, and health and safety measures are usually covered by DOE.
• The DOE’s Weatherization Assistance Program works with industry experts to establish training standards and certifications, and supports the accreditation of training providers. These certification programs are administered by the Interstate Renewable Energy Council (IREC).
• Leveraged funds can be used for certain programs that have a high initial upfront cost, but a better return-on-investment, which makes the projects viable for investors. Federal funds allow for comprehensive services to clients and more project development.
  • The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) provided $423 million in 2017, 45 percent of all funds.
  • Utility and state funds provided $255 million, 28 percent of all funds.

Dave Rinebolt notes that federal programs such as WAP and the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program provide valuable funds to help low-income households reduce their bills and improve their health.

• Ohio Partners for Affordable Energy uses a single application approach which allows households to apply to all the programs they need to improve the energy efficiency of their homes and achieve better health outcomes.
• Evaluations show the synergies resulting from combining funds lead to higher energy savings, including:
  • A 30 percent average reduction in heating costs.
  • A 10-12 percent reduction in electricity costs.
• Currently, Ohio is pivoting to deeper weatherization and retrofitting measures that provide more comprehensive energy efficiency and cost savings.
  • New lighting and refrigerator standards are eliminating low-hanging fruit in the market for energy efficiency.
  • There is a new focus on high efficiency heat pump HVAC systems, as those upgrades are more cost efficient and provide a higher return on investment than refrigeration and lighting upgrades.
  • There is also a new focus on multifamily properties, since those units are an underserved market.
• Improvements in indoor air quality lead to improvements in health. Weatherization generates $14,000 in value on average as a result of household members’ health improvements from measures that remove or reduce indoor pollutants. This comes in large part from fewer work absences due to sickness, and from fewer hospital visits. Those suffering from asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and hypertension have particularly benefited.

Dave Rinebolt explains the many health benefits of making homes more energy efficient, as well as the impact his organization is having on energy poverty in Ohio.

• Building a weatherization-based health program requires training and delivery infrastructure, partnerships with local health care providers, motivation through payments tied to outcomes, and additional funding, including insurance reimbursements.
• Reauthorizing the Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP) is critical. HR 2041 and S 983 are moving forward. These bills would improve the ability to blend different funding streams, treat renewables like any other Energy Conservation Measure (ECM), encourage multifamily weatherization, establish an innovation program to test new strategies, and increase funding authority.

 

Valerie Strauss, Director, Policy & Regulatory Affairs, Association for Energy Affordability, Inc.

• Energy costs are a serious challenge to housing affordability. In New York, over 3 million households are at or above the affordability threshold, which is when 30 percent of household income goes to housing costs. Controlling energy costs can help with overall affordability in housing, especially in multifamily buildings.
• 2.4 million households in New York are income eligible for the Home Energy Assistance Program (HEAP) and Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP), as they earn less than 60 percent of the state median income (SMI).
• New York pays $700 million/year on low-income energy assistance, and utility bill assistance represents more than two-thirds of that spending. Ideally, additional money should be spent on energy efficiency retrofits, to tackle the root causes of high utility bills.
• Leveraging existing funds from federal programs helps low-income households receive additional funding from the state.
• Assistance is more than just money. The benefits of energy efficient housing can include:
  • Lower bills to increase housing security.
  • Safer and healthier homes.
  • Equitable access to clean energy jobs.
• Best practices for weatherization programs include better incentives and cost-sharing, tenant benefits, a trained workforce, a comprehensive whole-building approach to retrofits, and clean energy to replace fossil fuels where feasible and appropriate.
• Federal funding, in the form of LIHEAP and WAP, is the foundation for energy efficiency work in states. But other programs are also critical, including utility programs, multifamily performance programs, the Weatherization Preservation Plus (P+) initiative, and Healthy Homes pilots.

 

Mark Jackson, Vice President of Energy Solutions, Community Housing Partners, Virginia

• Weatherization is the foundation of the U.S. energy efficiency market.
• The DOE set guidelines for standard work specifications, job task analysis, worker certification, and accredited training standards. Standard work specifications define the minimum requirements for the work being done to be considered effective, durable, and safe.
• There are four major energy upgrade job classifications. A career ladder allows for job progression and meaningful career development from retrofit installer, to crew leader, to energy auditor, to quality control inspector.
• Nationally-recognized industry credentials that are portable and transferable between the public and private sectors are essential to help people enter into renewable energy careers.
• The average cost of weatherizing a unit in Virginia is $4,695. The energy retrofits result in $264 in annual energy costs savings, on average (annual heating consumption and electric consumption decrease by 18 percent and 7 percent respectively).
• Weatherization directly supports 8,500 jobs in Virginia.
• There are even more benefits from energy efficiency upgrades in the realms of health, security, and other areas than there are from total savings in energy. For every $1 invested in weatherization, there are $1.72 in energy-related benefits and $2.78 in non-energy benefits.
• The highest return on investment comes from investing in low-income units.
• Weatherization is not just an energy efficiency program; it helps provide carbon monoxide detectors, and helps prevent mold in homes.
• Mark Jackson co-founded the Weatherizers Without Borders program to spread these benefits internationally.

 

Anne McKibbin, Policy Director, Elevate Energy, Illinois

Anne McKibbin explains the importance of energy efficiency and weatherization, especially for low-income households.

• In addition to paying a much higher percentage of their income for their gas and energy services than high-income families, low-income residents often live in older, draftier housing that has been less maintained over the years.
• The percentage of income that one pays for energy is very important: when people pay 10 percent or more of their income for utilities, they are 1.5-2 times more at risk of moving into poverty.
• Only 30 percent of families eligible for LIHEAP funding in Illinois are covered, because of budget constraints.
• Utilities are supplementing federal funds as well as running their own energy efficiency programs.
• Upgrading the efficiency of nonprofit buildings, such as childcare centers, is a priority.
• Energy efficiency programs have not been equitable historically.
  • Low-income communities of color have not had access to those programs.
  • Utilities often offer rebates, which are only useful to families that have money to buy things in the first place, but are not useful to families with low incomes. Utilities need to provide other ways to increase funding for low-income households.
• The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) and the Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP) have provided the backbone for families attempting to upgrade their energy efficiency.

Anne McKibbin talks about the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) and the Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP), two critically important federal programs that help low-income households become more energy efficient.

• Efforts are being made to coordinate LIHEAP programs with other programs.
• Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) is working on a program to develop solar energy programs via rooftop solar, which is cheaper than on-grid energy in Illinois.

 

Question & Answer Session:

 

• What is stopping landlords from raising rent after these services are provided?
  • There are some laws against increasing rent, but these are not always present.
  • The Association for Energy Affordability has adopted a carrot-and-stick approach: in order to access the funds, landlords must sign agreements that they will not transfer the costs onto tenants.
  • In Chicago, 70 percent of the housing is in naturally affordable housing areas where landlords have difficulty charging more rent because cheap housing is widely available, and competitive prices mean that no one is going to be willing to pay more for rent. Targeting the energy efficiency improvements to those areas helps with that issue.

 

• What does outreach look like when it comes to reaching out to low-income communities and communities of color?
  • It is important to build relationships and work with community organizations and field organizers (e.g., Kiwanis clubs, religious organizations, building owners associations). This helps build trust, especially when people don’t love and trust utilities. Using organizations that have pre-established trust is important to get people involved in the programs.
  • It is always important to prioritize elderly people and those with disabilities.
  • The waitlist for these programs can often be long, so it is important to manage the waiting list by only advertising the programs when you are able to provide the work. There is not enough money to serve everyone in need, so premature community outreach often results in long waiting lists, which can be frustrating for customers.
  • In Ohio, 40 percent of the homes approved for weatherization have an elderly person in them; over 70 percent have elderly and disabled people.
  • Until now, there has been a bias to focus on single family, occupant-owned housing, since energy efficiency work does a lot to increase the stability of low-income families.

 

• Is there any Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) involvement that you know of, since energy efficiency involves housing so closely?
  • HUD has residential data that is incredibly useful for subgrantees that want to weatherize properties. Federal agencies need to improve their ability to coordinate funding.
  • Rinebolt noted that Ohio Partners for Affordable Energy doesn’t use much HUD funding. These agencies are frustrating bureaucracies that are hard to work with.
  • According to Mustapha, HUD is involved in rental assistance, but not as involved in the LIHEAP program.

 

• What work do you do for renter protection?
  • Ohio Partners for Affordable Energy (OPAE) requires landlords to agree to not raise rent for three years, and enforces that agreement.
  • OPAE cannot require cost-sharing with renters in single family homes, but can do so for multi-family housing. OPAE won’t pay for certain items (such as windows, which have a longer payback period), but will accept funding from landlords or utilities for those items if the project’s overall return on investment is acceptable.

 

• To what extent do manufactured homes qualify for these programs?
  • In Ohio, manufactured homes represent a large portion of the homes that are weatherized by Ohio Partners for Affordable Energy, but the energy savings are not as significant as they are for conventional single-family homes.
    • New air source heat pumps can make a major difference. For example, serious energy can be saved by replacing electric baseboard heating with an energy efficient heat pump.
    • There is room for improvement in the manufacturing of these homes. Improvements would not make the homes significantly more expensive, it’s just about paying attention to details, but the manufacturers do not seem particularly interested in those details.
  • Mostly, appliance replacements will be done in manufactured homes, such as replacing heating systems. Changing from electric baseboard heat to heat pumps can lead to a huge drop in energy consumption.

 

As national policymakers debate important issues like public health, affordable housing, and sustainable energy, EEFA’s state coalitions are delivering on these objectives in communities across the country, thanks in large part to federal programs and state/local partners. In New York, WAP helps low-income households—particularly the elderly, people with disabilities, and children—to reduce their energy use and costs by improving the energy efficiency of their homes and ensuring their health and safety. By making their homes more energy efficient, these dollars help to lower household energy bills for many years to come, not just with a one-time infusion of cash. In California, the Low-Income Weatherization Program – Large Multi-Family (CA) provides energy efficiency retrofit/weatherization services to large multifamily dwellings in disadvantaged communities, to deliver significant and aggressive greenhouse gas reductions. In Ohio, DOE weatherization providers are focusing on insulation and heat pumps for all-electric homes and multifamily buildings (an important strategy for decarbonizing the building sector), while expanding ‘healthy homes’ services. In Virginia, affordable housing advocates are working to ensure that energy efficiency becomes a standard part of every multifamily renovation or new construction and that LMI renters and property owners have access to affordable funding/financing for robust energy efficiency upgrades.

Energy Efficiency for All is a coalition of national, state, and local environmental, consumer, and housing organizations that connects climate, health, and equity goals by bringing energy efficiency to affordable housing. The Natural Resources Defense Council, the National Housing Trust, Elevate Energy, and the Energy Foundation founded EEFA.