Low-Interest On-Bill Home Energy Efficiency Financing Comes to Connecticut
A new program by the United Illuminating Company (UI), an electric utility in Connecticut, is helping customers in the state afford energy efficiency improvements by allowing them to pay for those improvements on their monthly utility bills.
UI is the latest electric company to offer ‘on-bill’ financing, a nationwide trend among public utilities to encourage energy improvements by allowing customers to make monthly payments toward energy efficiency improvements on their utility bills over an extended repayment period, usually about 10 years. A similar program was launched in New York earlier this year.
Like a typical on-bill financing program, UI’s Residential Energy Efficiency Financing program adds monthly charges to customers’ bills estimated to match the amount of money the improvement is expected to save them that month. In this way, improvements are designed to be paid off by the savings they create.
UI has partnered with the Connecticut Energy Efficiency Fund to offer the low-interest energy efficiency improvement loans, which range from 2.99 percent to 4.99 percent. The utility announced this week that it completed its first energy efficiency improvements through the program to a home in Hamden, where contractors installed an ENERGY STAR-qualified central air system and two programmable thermostats.
To be eligible for the program, customers must complete a home energy audit through the Home Energy Solutions program, which is operated by the Connecticut Energy Efficiency Fund.
For more information about on-bill financing through UI’s Residential Energy Efficiency Financing program, residents can call 877WISE-USE or visit www.CTEnergyInfo.com.
Planning on taking advantage of on-bill financing for home energy efficiency improvements in Connecticut? Share your thoughts. Already a program participant? Let us know how the program is working for you.
Sources
UI Helping Customers to Finance Energy Conservation Purchases, Connecticut Watchdog, Sept. 20, 2011.