This practitioner-focused Toolkit for Residential Energy Efficiency Upgrade Programs was created by Green For All to assist new, established, and future energy efficiency programs launch and scale initiatives that can deliver the full promise of the green economy. It is intended as a practical resource that offers key examples, best practices, effective tools, and tested templates that a program manager can deploy to implement a variety of aspects of their program including:

• Generating sustained program demand
• Establishing innovative finance mechanisms to reach the largest consumer market possible
• Building job standards and contractor support into programs that result in family supporting jobs and community economic development.

Generally, the elements that form the toolkit are best practice briefs and summary documents, RFPs, contracts, and other program design and implementation templates that communities nationwide have used to create their own efficiency programs. 

INDEX

1. General Reference – General resources about energy efficiency programs and enabling policies.
2. High Road Strategies – Tools and templates to understand and implement High Road Strategies that create economic development opportunities for communities.
3. Financing & Repayment Mechanisms – Resources about financing energy efficiency upgrades to as broad a market segment as possible, including low and moderate income groups.
4. Increasing Contractor Capacity – Policies, tools, and case studies focused on building contractor capacity in the energy efficiency market. These resources highlight strategies that support small, historically under-represented contractors to grow their businesses.
5. Marketing & Demand Generation – Resources for generating demand amongst consumers and building the market for energy efficiency upgrades. This section focuses on outreach strategies that leverage community assets like community-based organizations and trusted messengers.
6. Workforce Development and Education – Resources that describe services, programs, systems and networks that provide education, skill development and improved access to jobs and career advancement in the energy efficiency sector.
7. Multi-Family Buildings – Resources targeted specifically to achieve energy efficiency upgrades in multifamily buildings such as apartment and condominium complexes.

About Communities Of Practice

The Toolkit is a project of Green For All’s Communities of Practice program, which works to lift up the models and tools that practitioners use at the local level to inform the design and implementation of programs across the nation. We are honored to work with some of the country’s most innovative efficiency programs to accelerate and replicate best practices so that the next generation of programs can achieve greater results more efficiently.

The Retrofit America’s Cities Communities of Practice operates under the premise that energy efficiency programs of today will prove that significant reductions in our national energy usage are not only achievable but will serve to stimulate economic development and create cleaner, healthier communities. These programs will generate the first standardized data about the benefits associated with efficient buildings, thereby informing building operators and residents about the long-term value of investing in efficiency in terms of financial savings, comfort, and health. In turn, the increased value of efficient buildings will help to create a viable and self-reliant market for energy efficiency.

Today’s energy efficiency programs are testing strategies and proving models that will form the foundation that the energy efficiency sector will build upon as it scales. Success will depend upon wide recognition of the benefits of energy efficiency, easy access to energy efficiency services by a large consumer base, and strong business models and a well-trained workforce that can consistently deliver those benefits to interested consumers.

This Toolkit address each of the specific components that Green For All has identified for achieving programmatic success. Each section offers tools and templates to implement the best practices that today’s energy efficiency programs have forged. Taken as a whole, the Toolkit offers the resources to build a strong, comprehensive program that can realize the full potential of the green economy.

Continue to General Resources

The Community of Practice web pages were made possible by the generous support of the Mitchell Kapor Foundation (www.mkf.org)