ESC Residential Consortium Minutes 091318

ESC Residential Consortium Minutes from September 13, 2018 Meeting was called to order at 2:02 pm Eastern Time Attendance: Black Hills Energy Ruth Hietbrink CenterPoint Energy Kathryn Knudson DTE Energy Chris Cole DTE Energy Rosana Laurain National Fuel Marti Sawyer National Fuel Jeffrey Kwiatkowski NW Natural Carollyn Farrar Vectren Gerry Jones October TMAF: If you haven’t registered for TMAF, and you would like to do so, there is still time. The next TMAF will be held from October 9 – 11 in Detroit, MI; our host utility is DTE Energy. The hotel cut off is September 17 so make your plans quickly. The location is Crowne Plaza Detroit Downtown Riverfront, Washington Blvd. Natural Living: If you haven’t received your hardcopies, they should be arriving shortly. The scheduled ship date was September 5th and some companies have reported receiving them. We had moved up the shipping of the fall issue by about one month, and Barb asked if that time frame worked or would members want to see something different. The majority on the call felt that the Spring issue should be mailed late January/early February to accommodate the local builder shows; many of which fall in February. The Fall issue would then be pegged for an August shipment. Barb will speak with the publisher about changing the timing of the magazine. 2019 Homebuilder, Realtor and Garden Show Calendar: ESC had an intern during the summer months, and she was able to create a calendar of Homebuilder, Realtor and Garden shows scheduled for 2019. This info will be shared with group. Status of DOE Regulations: The DOE recently shared their semi-annual agenda of items to be reviewed. It is interesting that listed on the proposed schedule is the minimum efficiency regulations for residential non-weatherized gas furnaces and residential cooking appliances. The schedule calls for a review of the furnace regs in September 2018 with cooking appliances in October 2018. AGA has noted that DOE has rarely met the published schedule but they will keep an eye on activity relating to these items. ACEEE Report on EHP’s: The American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) recently issued a report detailing programs that promote the use of electric heat pumps in place of natural gas, oil or propane furnaces and water heaters. More details can be found by looking at: http://aceee.org/blog/2018/08/new-programs-nudge-homeowners-switch The report goes on to state that these conversions to electric will be required in order to realize deep reductions in carbon dioxide emissions. The AGA BECS committee will be discussing the impact of these programs at their September meeting. More to follow. Open Discussion: Speaking about electrification, Barb wanted to make sure that members reviewed a recent article in the August/September issue of the AGA Magazine. In the state watch, under California, the article discusses two recent surveys that were conducted in that state pertaining to residents’ choice of fuel within their homes. One study was conducted by Navigant Consulting and the other study was conducted by the California Building Industry Association. The Navigant study revealed that for a Southern California home to convert to all-electric it would cost the household a minimum of $7,200 and the annual energy costs could increase by $877. The BIA study showed that only 1 in 10 homebuyers actually preferred an all-electric home. Furthermore, two-thirds of voters are against eliminating natural gas as a fuel. More details on the BIA study can be found at: http://www.biabuild.com/latest-news/2018/4/24/cbia-announces-findings-on-high-cost-of-electrifying-homes-and-californians-preference-for-natural-gas Ruth Hietbrink, Black Hills Energy, shared that she recently heard a discussion on NPR radio that California’s aggressive goal to be 100% “clean electric” power by 2045 may be too aggressive. And, based on the surveys mentioned above, may not be too popular! You can read the transcripts to NPR radio here: https://www.npr.org/2018/09/11/646801435/californias-new-clean-energy-goal-could-be-difficult-to-reach You can read more about the aggressive goal here: https://www.npr.org/2018/09/10/646373423/california-sets-goal-of-100-percent-renewable-electric-power-by-2045?utm_source=npr_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20180913&utm_campaign=npr_email_a_friend&utm_term=storyshare And here: https://www.npr.org/2018/09/11/646801435/californias-new-clean-energy-goal-could-be-difficult-to-reach?utm_source=npr_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20180913&utm_campaign=npr_email_a_friend&utm_term=storyshare The article links were compliments of Marti Sawyer, National Fuel. Chris Cole, DTE Energy, asked if there were any plans to host a reception in the AGA booth at the International Builder Show in 2019. Barb mentioned that the event was hosted in 2018 to fulfill the terms of the Builder Liaison Consortium as it was dissolved at the end of 2017. Based on Barb being present at the events in 2017 and 2018; she felt that we really didn’t have the opportunity to network with builders as anticipated. We did, in fact, end up feeding and providing beverages to a large number of people but not necessarily our target audience. If we would do something like this in the future, it would need to be more of a private event, invitation only, in a private location. Kat Knudson, CenterPoint Energy, MN, shared that they will be offering a loan repayment program, through CPE bills, for the regulated side of the business. They had previously offered a similar feature for the unregulated side. Of course, applicants must qualify in order to participate. Carollyn Farrar, NWN, shared that they have offered a loan repayment program via their bills for several years. Carollyn did caution that their approval process can take 3-5 business days and the approval is completed by a 3rd party. She also noted that some applicants are declined. Contractors who participate must be certified. Carollyn just wanted to share that contractors as well as applicants can become frustrated with the process; and there is definitely a learning curve! They offer this in Oregon through Savings Within Reach and in Washington under On-Bill Repayment. Here is a link to NWN’s program: https://www.energytrust.org/incentives/savings-within-reach-on-bill-repayment/#tab-two The meeting was adjourned at approximately 2:40 pm.