Claude Albert/ CT Mirror
An energy audit underway.
Hamden houses may soon find contractors caulking shut their leaks as the town aims for higher residential energy efficiency.
That’s because on Monday evening, the town’s Energy Use and Climate Change Commission endorsed a program that would help the town become a leader in residential energy efficiency.
The plan, presented by Patrice Gillespie of the Connecticut Clean Water Fund (CWF), would enact a partnership with CWF run a campaign to encourage Hamden residents to have energy audits and efficiency upgrades on their homes through the Home Energy Solutions Program, run by Energize CT.
The commission voted to send a letter to the mayor stating its support for the idea. As an advisory commission, the Energy Use and Climate Change Commission can only make recommendations. The power to actually enact any programming lies with the mayor and Legislative Council.
People are “spending way too much of their income on energy that is being wasted,” Gillespie told the commission. Only 17 percent of Connecticut households have done energy audits on their homes, she said. Many fewer, she added, have taken the next step of making larger improvements.
The plan Gillespie presented to the commission Monday would make Hamden one of the seven or eight Connecticut towns to join CWF for the first phase of an energy efficiency campaign.
At the meeting, Hamden Energy Efficiency Coordinator Kathleen Schomaker compared the campaign to the solarize campaigns the town has done in the past. It would launch on a certain date and end on a certain date, and would aim to inform residents about the benefits of weatherizing and about the services available for them to do so. The campaign would involve canvassing, outreach to churches, the rotary club, garden clubs, and other community groups.
Gillespie said that multi-family housing units present a particular challenge because landlords are often not around much. She said that in those cases, it often takes a large group of renters to organize and together ask the landlord for efficiency improvements.
The goal, said Gillespie, would be to encourage more people to get energy audits on their homes, and then to install the subsequent energy efficiency updates. The focus would be on low and middle income homeowners.
Gillespie said that CWF is seeking funding for the campaign. “It’s a program that deserves funding and we hope to find some,” she said.
Other towns under consideration include New Haven and North Haven, though New Haven has not yet received the presentation that Hamden got on Monday.
When Connecticut residents perform energy audits on their homes, a large portion of the cost is paid for by the utility. Energy bills in Connecticut, explained Gillespie, include a small “combined public benefit charge.” The utility uses the funds raised from those charges to fund energy audits.
“Home energy audits are step one in finding out the thermal dynamics of a home,” Gillespie told the Independent. In an audit, a contractor places a fan in a doorway that measures how much air it can suck out of the house. The contractor then tries to close the house’s leaks, install LEDs, water saving devices on faucets, and other energy saving measures.
The audit, said Gillespie, generally costs around $1,000, including the various small improvements that the contractor makes to the house. The homeowner must pay the co-pay — $149 for those with gas or electric heating and $174 for those with oil — and utility pays the rest. According to Energize CT, the minor improvements that come with energy audits usually save homeowners $200-$250 on their annual energy bills.
Yet the audit is only the beginning, said Gillespie. The contractor then recommends more involved improvements to the house, which often include installing insulation or improving the heating system. As the Energize CT website explains, homeowners have the option of taking out a $1,000 to $3,000 loan with 0 percent interest to finance the work, which they can pay in their energy bills to United Illuminating in the case of Hamden and New Haven or Eversource in other towns.
Oftentimes, said Gillespie, the work saves enough energy that even with the loan payments lumped into the energy bill, the overall bill does not increase. Once ratepayers have paid off the loan, their energy bills then decrease significantly.
The campaign is still in its infancy, and Hamden’s involvement is still only a possibility. The commission must now draft a letter to Mayor Curt Leng, who will decide whether or not to participate.