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Cashing In On Home Improvements
Would you like some financial help to upgrade your home's energy efficiency?
Homeowners contemplating energy retrofits to their homes can benefit from the Government of Canada's EnerGuide for Houses Retrofit Incentive. Take advantage of this service aimed at helping homeowners make more energy efficient choices to lower their energy bills and reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Learn about the requirements for how the grant is determined to receive a grant from $116 to $3,348, with the average amount being $630.
The EnerGuide for Houses Retrofit Incentive process involves the following five steps:
Step One: Schedule an Evaluation
The first step is to book an appointment with an independent home energy advisor who assesses how your home uses energy and where it is being wasted. There is a fee for this service and the price varies across the country.
"EnerGuide for Houses provides the homeowner with a confidential, impartial, accurate assessment of the energy efficiency of their specific home," explains Bryan Cuthill, head of special projects for HomePerformance. The Vancouver-based firm is one of many Canadian companies using trained, certified energy advisors to help homeowners identify energy efficiency improvements.
"The most important tip I give to homeowners is, 'Get the EnerGuide for Houses evaluation first'," cautions Cuthill. "Book it now. Don't wait until you've spoken to your contractors, or started the work yourself, otherwise you may lose out on valuable grant money."
Step Two: Learn from Your Advisor
A home advisor can be a goldmine of information as he or she conducts the roughly two-hour tour of your home. The EnerGuide evaluation includes:
- A "blower door" test to identify air-leakage points.
- A comprehensive walk-through of your house to collect data for modelling your home's energy use.
- An EnerGuide for Houses Report with customized energy upgrade recommendations for your home.
- An estimate of annual energy consumption along with an EnerGuide for Houses rating and label.
"We look at the whole house as a system," explains advisor Garry Lowney, a HomePerformance inspector and trainer with 4,500 completed evaluations in his portfolio. "Every house is completely different in its heat loss. Two similar houses can have very different heat loss characteristics."
Lowney encourages homeowners to use the evaluation as a learning experience and to ask the energy advisor a lot of questions.
Step Three: Get the Rating
"Since our energy efficient improvements were made, our gas consumption has reduced by 35%, resulting in a $600 savings in the past year. We also received a $1,181 rebate from the federal government."
– Joanne Lennon, Ottawa
An EnerGuide for Houses rating is a standard measure of your home's energy performance. A home's energy efficiency level is rated on a scale of 0 to 100. A rating of 0 represents a home with major air leakage, no insulation and extremely high energy consumption. A rating of 100 represents a house that is airtight, is well insulated, is sufficiently ventilated and requires no purchased energy. Older houses that have not been upgraded generally rate between 0 and 50. An energy-efficient old house or a typical new house rates between 66 and 74.
Step Four: Improvements and
Re-evaluation
Your energy advisor will tell you which changes will have the greatest impact on your home's energy efficiency. According to HomePerformance's Lowney, the top choices for energy-efficient improvements that lead to grants are high-efficiency heating equipment and air sealing which includes caulking and weatherstripping. He reiterates the caution that there will be variables that affect performance.
Complete some or all of the recommended improvements within 18 months of your initial evaluation. If you decide to make improvements to your home, schedule a follow-up visit to find out how much you have improved your home's efficiency. If your re-evaluation shows a minimum energy performance improvement, you may be eligible for the EnerGuide for Houses Retrofit Incentive.
Step Five: Apply for the Grant
The energy advisor who conducted the evaluation will apply for the grant on your behalf after your home has been re-evaluated. He or she will complete all the paperwork for you to sign and will tell you how much of a grant you can expect to receive.
The grant application must be submitted by the energy advisor to Natural Resources Canada no later than 18 calendar months after the date of the pre-retrofit evaluation. Applications will be accepted until March 31, 2010.
In Lowney's experience, the average grant is $700. In the case of homeowners living in Vancouver's mild climate, conversions to air pumps have led to grants as high as $1,500. Owners in colder areas, he says, won't see those types of gains unless they consider alternatives such as geothermal systems that take heat from under the ground.
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