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Home Performance Industry News

• Click here to view a syndicated collection of industry news.

Home Performance Contracting Professional Organizations

• ACI – Advancing Home Performance – ACI, a non-profit organization, celebrated 20 years of training building and housing professionals in 2006.  Founded as the Affordable Comfort Conference in 1986, our roots are in defining the best way to make homes energy efficient, without harming the residents and the building.
• Efficiency First – Efficiency First is a Non-Profit Trade Association dedicated to retrofitting America’s homes, building the industry infrastructure to create jobs, and reducing energy consumption, carbon emissions, and our dependence on foreign oil. Efficiency First represents America’s Home Performance Workforce, ranging from energy auditors and raters to contractors who are the front line of our climate battle, embodied in green-collar jobs from weatherization to HVAC. Efficiency First is organized so that the Home Performance Workforce can be represented in both National and State level policy conversations.
• Home Performance Resource Center – The Home Performance Resource Center is a national nonprofit organization formed to conduct public policy and market research in support of the Home Performance industry. The Resource Center develops research materials for policymakers, energy program managers and industry leaders to promote job creation, economic recovery, lower household energy bills and deep reductions in residential carbon emissions through improved home energy efficiency.

Training and Certifying Organizations

• Building Performance Institute – The Building Performance Institute (BPI) offers nationally-recognized training, certification, accreditation and quality-assurance programs. Raising the bar in home performance contracting.
• Residential Energy Services Network – The Residential Energy Services Network’s (RESNET ^® ) mission is to ensure the success of the building energy performance certification industry, set the standards of quality, and increase the opportunity for ownership of high performance buildings.
• Home Performance with EnergyStar – Home Performance with ENERGY STAR, a national program from the U.S. EPA and U.S. DOE, offers a comprehensive, whole-house approach to improving energy efficiency and comfort at home, while helping to protect the environment.  This program is currently not available in Washington State due to lack of a program sponsor.

State Home Performance Groups

• California Building Performance Contracting Association – California Building Performance Contractors Association (CBPCA) helps green contractors identify and perform quality Green Home Energy Upgrades—our name for comprehensive (i.e., whole-house) energy efficiency improvements that improve homeowner’s comfort and indoor air quality while lowering their energy bills. We are a non-profit, utility-sponsored organization dedicated to improving residential energy efficiency in California.
• Building Performance Contractors Association / NYS – The Building Performance Contractors Association / NYS is a coalition of building performance contractors, home energy raters, building diagnosticians, energy auditors & consultants in New York State providing services which increase the comfort, health and safety, efficiency and durability of housing through the treatment of the house as a whole system.
• Maine Home Performance – The mission of Maine Home Performance with Energy Star is to create a sustainable market throughout the State of Maine for diagnosis and treatment of homes to make them healthy, comfortable and energy efficient. The Program links Maine homeowners with qualified and certified Evaluators who provide one-stop-shop access to a whole-house approach to home improvements.
• PA Home Energy – PA Home Energy is a new program that is focused on helping Pennsylvania consumers reduce their home energy use. The program integrates the general principles of whole house performance with green home design. At the heart of PA Home Energy is ENERGY STAR – a joint program of the U.S. Department of Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
• Home Performance Contractors Guild of Oregon – The HPC Guild represents a collective of contractors that have been instrumental in the development of energy efficiency programs in the Portland area such as Clean Energy Works Portland. We continue to work with policymakers at the city and Metro level, with the Energy Trust, and with financial institutions to improve these programs and bring them to scale.  The HPC Guild serves as the Efficiency First chapter for the state of Oregon.

Utility Conservation Programs

• Puget Sound Energy HomePrint Audit Program – The first step toward saving energy is knowing how you use it. PSE residential electric customers can get a up to a $350 instant rebate* from PSE for a HomePrint home performance evaluation.
• Seattle City Light Home Energy Audits – Seattle residents with electrically heated homes can receive a discounted energy audit through City Light.

State of Washington Agencies

• Department of Labor and Industries – Weatherization Prevailing Wage Primer – Increasingly, the state of Washington Prevailing Wage Law applies to energy efficiency projects which receive public funding. Compliance has been a source of confusion for many contractors.  This web page can help point you in the right direction.
• WSE Energy Program – Applied Building Science – WSU’s Energy Extension in Olympia serves as the state’s technical resource for green building and energy retrofit programs.  Many programs are administered by this office.
• Department of Commerce Energy Policy Division  – Commerce administers the state’s low income weatherization program and drafts energy policy for the state.
• Federal Prevailing Wage Rates – The most definitive and up-to-date information regarding the federal Davis-Bacon prevailing wage from the U.S. Department of Labor.

Publications 

• Home Energy Magazine – Home Energy magazine’s mission is to disseminate objective and practical information on residential energy efficiency, performance, comfort, and affordability. It is the only magazine that thoroughly covers residential comfort issues from the only approach that really works, systems engineering.
• Do It Yourself Home Energy Audit – Published in 2008 by the Seattle Green Building Program, this downloadable guide shows you the ins and out of energy audits, including the benefits of hiring a professional who can perform pressure diagnostics and thermal scans using infrared imaging. Print copies are available from various local agencies and utilities.
• Unlocking energy efficiency in the US economy (McKinsey, 2009) In this report, McKinsey & Company offers a detailed analysis of the magnitude of the efficiency potential in non-transportation uses of energy, a thorough assessment of the barriers that impede the capture of greater efficiency, and an outline of the practical solutions available to unlock the potential.
• Rebuilding America A Policy Framework for Investment in Energy Efficiency Retrofits (Center for American Progress, 2009) Without a strong public policy framework, the private sector acting alone will not invest to maximize the clear private and public benefits of encouraging comprehensive energy efficiency, and the harm to the global climate will continue unabated. Over time, however, the public-sector role in jump starting these new energy efficiency markets can be reduced as the private sector develops improved business and finance models and once a price is established on global warming pollution. That is the path outlined in this paper.