Michael Chasnow is a Finance Analyst with the Environmental Finance Center.
Although there are dozens of city and state-led residential energy efficiency and renewable energy (EERE) retrofit programs across the country, little research has focused on how individual homeowners perceive these retrofit programs or decide whether to conduct energy efficiency retrofits. Not surprisingly, some programs thrive (such as PA’s Keystone HELP with 6,000+ customers and $40+ mill. in loans), while others flounder. We need to better understand how residential homeowners decide whether to conduct an EERE, from messaging to financing to program process.
Accordingly, with two local partners, AFC First and the Energy Coordinating Agency, the Environmental Finance Center at the University of North Carolina surveyed 440+ residential homeowners in the Philadelphia metro area that are potential participants in the EERE retrofit program EnergyWorks to learn more about key drivers behind homeowners’ decisions to conduct or not conduct EERE retrofits. Below are the three key questions we asked, and some of the key takeaways of the study.
