The Home Star Initiative
Home Star is a fast-acting, short-term, job creation program that will drive new private investment into the hard hit construction and manufacturing sectors, while saving consumers money on their energy bills and providing up to $8,000 in rebates for home weatherization.
UPDATE!
May 5, 2010 - The House of Representatives passed Home Star with bipartisan support, 246-161.
The Home Star Energy Retrofit Act of 2010 is one step closer to becoming law!
Find out how your Representative voted.
Overview
Home Star is a fast-acting, short-term, job creation program that will drive new private investment into the hard hit construction and manufacturing sectors, while saving consumers money on their energy bills and providing up to $8,000 in rebates for home weatherization.
Home Star legislation is currently being considered in the Senate. The House of Representatives passed the Home Star Energy Retrofit Act of 2010 (H.R. 5019) on May 5, 2010.
While national unemployment levels in March remained at 9.7 percent, unemployment in the construction industry stood at 24.9 percent. Since 2006, the residential construction sector has lost 1.3 million jobs, a 38 percent drop in employment. The building materials manufacturing sector is operating at less than 60 percent of available capacity with 24.5 percent unemployment.
Home Star can rapidly create jobs, save consumers money, and promote energy efficiency.
The Home Star program will:
- Provide rebates to homeowners for energy efficiency retrofits. Up to $3,000 rebate for insulation and other measures. Up to $8,000 rebate for full home retrofits.
- Create 168,000 jobs[1] in skilled construction and manufacturing, two of the hardest hit sectors during the U.S. economic downturn.
- Invest $6 billion in the form of consumer rebates to be matched by private investment.
- Help over three million American families to retrofit their homes to increase energy efficiency and save them as much as $9.5 billion in energy costs over 10 years.
- Remove the equivalent of 615,000 cars from the road, or four 300 megawatt power plants from operation.
- Dedicate $200 million to provide access to low interest financing.
- Use a majority of manufactured goods made in the U.S., averaging well over 90 percent domestic production.
Download The Case for Home Star. (1-page PDF)
Download an overview of Home Star. (11-page PDF)
Green For All is an endorsing member of the Home Star Coalition.
[1] Independent analysis by Climate Works using McKinsey and REMI economic models.
