Have You Started YOUR Energy Plan?

By Julia Dundorf
Manager of Community Relations and Co-director of the New England Carbon Challenge,
Clean Air – Cool Planet

 

 

We hear a lot about green jobs and restarting the economy these days.  We also hear veiled and not-so-veiled dispersions about addressing energy consumption and climate change.  It’s going to kill jobs ya know! 

Despite numerous prestigious economic reports of the value and imperative of addressing climate and energy issues earlier rather than later – check out the Stern Report or the more local report out of the University of NH New Hampshire’s Green Economy and Industries: Current Employment and Future Opportunities – we’re still living in this rabbit hole of short sighted, antiquated paradigms.

In my work at Clean Air-Cool Planet as Manager of Community Relations and Co-director of the New England Carbon Challenge, I talk to people a lot about what they can do to take control of their own energy future – municipal and energy committee leaders, homeowners and renters, legislators and kids.  It all boils down to some pretty simple precepts.  I shared some of these thoughts the other day at the exceptional Housing Conference that NH Housing Finance Authority puts on every year in Concord and again to some of the Build Green NH folks at the Building NH Trade Show and Conference organized by the Home Builders and Remodelers Association of NH.

Regardless of one’s ideological framing, the way we mindlessly expend energy is senseless.  Pick your button issue – energy independence, climate change, foreign (or domestic) fossil fuel markets, environmental impacts of fossil fuel extraction or burning (think Gulf spill), green jobs, peak oil, resource conservation, rising energy costs (we can be sure they will) – they all point to the absurdity of our profligate addition to all things energy.  “Alright Dundorf, enough of the soapbox, give us specifics,” you say?  

Let’s look at heating fuels, according to the US Energy Information Administration, 82% of the nation’s fuel oil and kerosene sales are in the Northeast.

Figure 3. Residential Heating Oil Sales By Region

That’s a stunning statistic.  Now overlay this rough reference point… for every $1 spent in the region on heating fuels, only about 10 to 15 cents stay in the region, driving the local economy.  This just makes no business sense.  We’re not only letting our precious energy leak out of our aging building stock, through inefficient building techniques and business as usual practices, but we’re letting our energy dollars leak out of our region.

Simply put… this is MISSED OPPORTUNITY! 

Again whatever your ideological drivers, can’t we agree on THAT?  What could the other $.85 – $.90 for every $1 of heating fuels buy us?  More efficient schools or teachers, healthcare for all children, tax refund checks or incentives to put in the energy efficiency measure that will drive down this energy consumption?  Pick YOUR priority. They’re all important.  They’re all possible if we prioritize energy conservation, efficiency and clear, renewable energy sources. 

One more stat for you to chew on, “Every dollar invested in efficiency returns $2.60 to New Englanders” according to the recently released report from the Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnerships, “From Potential to Action:  How New England Can Save Energy, Cut Costs,  and Create a Brighter Future with Energy Efficiency”.

So what are we waiting for?  Before you pull out your cans of spray foam, learn how to build storm windows, or hire an energy auditor to assess your energy-saving opportunities, make a plan.  We seem to make plans for everything in our lives but rarely do we lay out our short and longer term plans for reducing energy consumption.  I’ve got just the tool to walk you through it and help you get those energy project done.  Visit myenergyplan.net and start planning today.

While you’re there check out the schedule of Button Up NH Workshops, free, public trainings on how your home uses energy and what you can do about it.  By the way, these tools are largely funded through RGGI, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, in this case through NH’s Public Utilities Commission’s Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reduction Fund.  The RGGI program is expressly designed to stimulate and support reductions of emissions, e.g. reductions in energy consumption.  Yet in our topsy-turvy priorities, even THAT program is beleaguered.  But that’s another rant for another day.

Let’s stop the bickering and denial and take advantage of the missed opportunities happening every minute in our region. 

If not us then who?

If not now, then when?

A Recipe for a Successful Weatherization Program

By: Garry Dow
Community Outreach Coordinator
Clean Air-Cool Planet

 
The Quinn family of East Montpelier owned a classic 200-year-old Vermont farmhouse. They loved it, but the house was poorly insulated and, every winter, heat would escape through the roof. For the Quinn family, this meant high energy bills, large ice dams and a constant winter chill. Then, in 2008 – with the help of a new home weatherization program called “Button Up Vermont” – the Quinns made a number of basic home weatherization improvements to the building. 

The family saved $900 in the first year and never looked back.

In the summer of 2009 – with these kinds of success stories leaking out of Vermont faster than wood heat from a New England farmhouse in winter – Clean Air-Cool Planet made the decision to bring this highly successful home weatherization workshop to New Hampshire. With the help of Robert Walker of the Sustainable Energy Resource Group in Thetford Center, VT the program was adapted and Button Up NH was born.

The result was a pilot launch of nine regional workshops coordinated by the New England Carbon Challenge that attracted 250 attendees in just 6 weeks. Each workshop was conducted by a trained energy auditor in collaboration with a local workshop organizer. Workshop locations included New London, Concord, Dover, Sanbornton, Lebanon, Rye, Grafton, Plymouth and Atkinson.

On average participants gave the workshop high marks – and the vast majority said they planned to perform or solicit some measure of home weatherization as a result of attending the workshop.   

A typical workshop agenda included: (1) the presentation of a prepared slideshow to introduce homeowners to the basics of home energy use and loss, the value of a home energy audit, the short term benefits of simple do-it-yourself weatherization, the long term benefits of extensive energy retrofits, and the technical and financial resources available to make it happen (2) the demonstration of several pieces of equipment commonly used by professional home energy auditors (3) a lively question and answer session and (4) an optional presentation given by a local speaker on an energy related topic.

In several instances workshops were taped and aired live on local cable television. In all instances local  libraries received copies of a DVD entitled Simple Weatherization Measures to Button Up Your Home. Some workshops invited local vendors to hawk useful items to interested consumers. Others invited family-run stores to present lucky attendees with door prizes for coming. Still others asked local patrons to volunteer time or donate coffee or bake cookies.

In doing so, each workshop accomplished something of fundamental importance: it  bridged the gap between the people who had the information and the people who needed it. Button Up empowered homeowners – like the Quinn family –  to choose what is right and act on it. This is a recipe for successfully weatherizing a community or a state or a region that is infinitely replicable, to wit: Take a handful of dedicated local organizers; mix in a few trained presenters; sift in a wealth of knowledge and a gift for public speaking; sprinkle with just the right mixture of content; simmer until a curious and engaging crowd appears; and serve promptly.

Interested in learning more? Contact Garry Dow at gdow@cleanair-coolplanet.org.

The Button Up program was originally created as Button Up Vermont in 2008 by Central Vermont Community Action Council with the support of Efficiency Vermont and the Vermont Energy and Climate Action Network, with funding from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. Funding for the initial launch of Button Up New Hampshire was made possible through grants from the Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reduction Fund of the NH Public Utilities Commission and Jane’s Trust. Input and programmatic support for Button Up NH was also provided through the Residential Energy Performance Association (REPA) and the Local Energy Committee Working Group.

Workshop Breathes New Life into Old Houses in New Hampshire

By Garry Dow,
Community Outreach Coordinator,
Clean Air-Cool Planet

“Houses breathe?” she asked. “Houses breathe,” I replied.

The old woman peered out over her wire rimmed glasses. “Really?”

“Really,” I said.

We were standing in the middle of the Tracy Memorial Library in New London, NH. The room was a jumble of competing voices and folding chairs, but she had the look of a woman trying to sort things out. A woman busy rearranging the furniture of her own mind. A crowd was in motion around us – the kind of social frenzy that preludes a public gathering – but the old woman stood perfectly still.

“Well then,” she said. “I’ve come to the right place.”

Nearly 30 people representing half a dozen towns from the Upper Valley came out on a cold and blustery Thursday evening last week to participate in the inaugural launch of Button Up NH – the highly successful home weatherization workshop pioneered in Vermont and now available in New Hampshire.

New London is the first of nine regional weatherization workshops sponsored by Button Up NH this winter. Others include Lebanon, Grafton, Plymouth, Sanbornton, Concord, Dover, Atkinson and Rye. These workshops are conducted by qualified home energy experts and include information on how simple household adjustments and modest investments can lead to significant energy savings over time.

The standing-room-only event was well attended and well received. The oversized crowd included professional energy auditors, the sustainability coordinator from nearby Colby-Sawyer College, a dozen or more curious homeowners, and a large contingent of local energy enthusiasts. Robert Walker of the Sustainable Energy Resource Group led the workshop, which was sponsored by the New London Energy Committee.

During the two hour session, Walker guided an eager audience through a dizzying terrain of home energy budgets, simple do-it-yourself weatherization measures, professional home energy audits, extensive professional energy retrofits, health and safety concerns, and technical and financial resources.

Weatherization, Walker said, is not complicated. Some projects require a professional, but at a fundamental level, weatherizing is about sealing holes (air barriers) and insulating spaces (thermal barriers) – in that order.

“To know what holes to seal and what spaces to insulate, however, you have to know how air moves through a building.”

In a typical house cold air is sucked in through the basement and expelled through the attic. Convection. At the same time, heat is being lost through barriers in the house where the temperature gradient between inside and outside is the steepest. Conduction.

Wrapping the building in a continuously sealed envelope buffered by insulation keeps cold air out and warm air in. This slows the movement of air through the home and minimizes the occurrence of warm air meeting cold. The result is a shorter exchange of air and a greater retention of heat.

“You want something like a quarter of the air in your house to turnover each hour,” Walker said. “If you button up too tight it can lead to problems with moisture and unhealthy air. So you always want to strike a balance between too little air flow and too much air flow.”

In one highlighted example, a family in Sunapee, NH invested $6,578 (with $3,450 in rebate returns) and now saves $3,000 annually after a payback period of only 1.5 years.

The audience asked questions throughout the presentation. They ranged from the best kind of insulation to use for a specific weatherization job to the physics of heat loss and everything in between.

Eventually the workshop broke up and the crowd poured into the street. As the last of the cars disappeared over the ridge that divides the Connecticut and Merrimack River valleys, I found myself completely alone for the first time that evening.

Outside a neat line of old houses dotted the road. The sky was a star-studded black and the air was pure cold. It hurt just to breathe. In a building across the way, two large windows were lit by the warm glow of an unseen lamp. The face of the building looked remarkably human. Two yellow eyes staring out from beneath the brow of a covered porch. Not unlike our own Button Up logo.

“Houses breathe?” the old woman had asked. “Houses breathe,” I had replied.

Yes they do, I thought, and turned for home.

All Button Up NH workshops are free and open to the public. For more information, please contact Garry Dow, Button Up NH Coordinator, at (603) 422-6464, ext. 115 or gdow@cleanair-coolplanet.org.