I work for a community services organisation that offers free energy audits to low income customers as part of a partnership with an energy retailer in Australia. We are trying to improve the effectiveness of the program and are looking for additional information on barriers to energy efficiency programs amongst low income families. We have been running the program for a couple of years, and we're interested in other people's experiences with similar programs. We're also exploring the availability of databases to manage/evaluate the data we collect, and would appreciate any information or direction in this area.
Cheers,
Matthew Cairns
Energy/Financial Project Worker
Kildonan Child & Family Services
Melbourne, Australia
Information on Barriers to Energy Audits for Low Income Customers
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Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E), a public utility that serves most of northern California, offers free energy audits to its residential customers. I used this program once when I was younger and renting a place. I was frustrated to find that most of the things the audit found were physical improvements that neither the owner nor property manger were interested in doing.
Matthew,
The Alternative Technology Association (www.ata.org.au) have experience running energy audit and retrofit programs with low-income households and may be able to provide some assistance. They are located at level 1/39 little Collins street in Melbourne.
Cheers
MOC
Hi Matthew,
Given that you work for a program that's already doing audits, I would think that you could get a lot of valid info in a hurry just by asking your staff who do the audits what they think the barriers are. You could also ask the next 100 families you audit a question like "You know it's great that you've allowed us to come and do this free audit for you. Yet many eligible families don't take advantage of our services. I wonder if you have any ideas why some families very much like yours don't want our free audit." Here are some possible barriers, based on my own thoughts, not any research. I'm an American, so some may not pertain to Australia. *Language barrier with marketing materials, scheduling process, or speaking to auditor *No interest because utilities are bundled with rent, so no financial incentive to conserve *Times available for the audit are inconvenient *Head of household is a female and wouldn't be comfortable letting a strange man into her apartment *Finances are so tight they have no capital to invest in money-saving alternatives *Time window for the audit is too long (e.g., "Tuesday between 1 and 5") *They don't understand your marketing literature because it is too complex and their literacy is low *They don't think there is likely to be a worthwhile financial payoff in the next few months *Some low income people move frequently, so they aren't interested in infrastructure improvements *They are already very low energy consumers (no heat in winter, no A/C in summer), and think that any efforts to conserve would only make them more uncomfortable *They do not like governmental or quasi-governmental authority figures in general *Some aspect of their living situation is illegal (e.g., a tenant not on the lease) so they won't let anyone in to see it *They are embarrassed that their apartment is cramped, dirty, "not fit for visitors" (particularly an issue for elderly people) *Past experience with similar programs has been negative *Fearful that the audit is a cover story for a sales pitch for products (and they have low sales resistance) *Fearful that the audit is a cover story for something else having to do with social work or police investigation *Knowing that they haven't been able to break any other bad habits in years, so why bother learning how they should conserve energy if they already know they won't really be able to change their energy-consumption behaviors.
Best Regards,
Bruce Karney
[email protected]
+1 650 450-0332 (mobile)
+1 650 964-3567 (home office)
+1 650 903-0954 (fax)
833 Bush St.,
Mountain View, CA 94041 USA
Matthew,
The Low-Income Energy Network here in Toronto, Canada may have some useful resources: http://www.lowincomeenergy.ca/A55AB4/lien.nsf/All/home As well, here are some links to other relevant groups: http://www.shscorp.ca/content.aspx?file=Energy/GreenLightInitiative/GreenLig htInitiative.htm http://www.newrules.org/electricity/lowincome.html http://www.greencommunitiesonline.org/ http://www.oikos.com/news/2005/12.html#GreenBuilt http://greenbuilthome.org/docs/Green%20Affordable%20Press%20Release.pdf http://greenbuilthome.org/docs/GBH_AFFORDABLE.pdf
Good luck with your efforts!
Regards,
Kevin Devitt
Toronto, Ontario CANADA
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