Alberta should improve home-energy efficiency measures

We’re currently the only province without a program for households, writes Jesse Row

For years, Alberta has been the only province without energy efficiency programs for households. Where has that left us? The numbers show that Alberta is currently second worst in Canada when it comes to under-insulated houses.

This conclusion is based on 634,000 home energy audits completed across the country. The result was that about 78 per cent of houses in Alberta are considered significantly under insulated. For a typical home in Calgary, this can add up to an extra $400 each year in higher energy bills.

These are costs that households don’t need to be saddled with. In every other province, there are programs that help households, as well as businesses, save energy through cost-effective efficiency upgrades. Everyone knows that energy efficiency, when done well, pays for itself.

Energy efficiency is also good for the economic health of our province. When money isn’t spent on utility bills, it can be invested into other areas such as growing a business or just weathering an economic downturn like the one we’re in now.

For decades, different places have been trying to figure out how to get the most out of energy efficiency and keep utility bills from climbing.

A lot of improvements have been made to efficiency standards for appliances and other equipment, which has paid off for consumers, but new standards only mandate minimum efficiency levels for new products.

What about existing products with extremely long lifetimes, such as buildings? How about going beyond minimum standards and making the most of energy efficiency opportunities available? This is where energy efficiency programs have proven their worth.

Energy efficiency programs have a long track record of saving consumers more money than they cost. They’ve been able to successfully increase insulation levels, repair drafty buildings and replace equipment with topperforming models, not just ones that meet minimum requirements.

These energy efficiency upgrades not only pay off directly, they save money on larger infrastructure investments. A good example of this is New England, where more than $400 million of electricity transmission projects have been significantly deferred because of energy efficiency programs. These are savings that reduce both the fixed and variable charges on your bill.

We’ve been ignoring energy efficiency for too long in Alberta. Our reaction to a drafty home or building is to crank up the heat or air conditioning when temperatures become uncomfortable. We don’t address the root cause of this problem because we often don’t see it (except on our utility bills).

Now is the time to take advantage of being second-worst in under-insulated buildings in the country by enabling and incenting deep energy retrofits. Now is the time to help all households and businesses reduce their energy use so we can better manage costs in our utility system.

When we look at what others have done, they’ve used a variety of programs to support these types of upgrades. These include programs for homeowners, including low- and fixed-income households, renters, businesses and non-profit organizations. These programs have been carefully refined over the years to help overcome barriers to energy efficiency unique to each group.

Perhaps above all, these programs have proven themselves to be cost effective. Almost all energy efficiency programs need to report annually to a utility regulator to make sure they’re saving consumers more money than they cost. Not only have regulators confirmed these programs increase energy efficiency beyond business-as-usual scenarios, they have consistently approved increases in energy efficiency budgets year over year.

It’s been over 20 years since Alberta has had an office of energy efficiency. Since then, we’ve done programs when there’s been a budget surplus, but these have been small and inconsistent compared to other provinces and states.

It’s time we took this opportunity seriously so we can benefit the same way others have by saving money and getting more comfortable buildings at the same time.