Ian M. Hoffman

Interactions between Energy Efficiency Programs funded under the Recovery Act and Utility Customer-Funded Energy Efficiency Programs

The American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA) provided billions of federal dollars to support investments in energy efficiency at the state and local level. How state energy offices chose to allocate those funds and how those programs interacted with existing utility customer-funded programs is the subject of this report from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The study examines these choices and interactions for insights into an emerging and increasingly complex world of multiple program administrators and funding sources. The paper suggests the Recovery Act experience has clear implications for the future of U.S. energy efficiency.

Energy Savings Lifetimes and Persistence

This technical brief explains the concepts of energy savings lifetimes and savings persistence and discusses how program administrators use these factors to calculate savings for efficiency measures, programs and portfolios. Savings lifetime is the length of time that one or more energy efficiency measures or activities save energy, and savings persistence is the change in savings throughout the functional life of a given efficiency measure or activity. Savings lifetimes are essential for assessing the lifecycle benefits and cost effectiveness of efficiency activities and for forecasting loads in resource planning. The brief also provides estimates of savings lifetimes derived from a national collection of costs and savings for electric efficiency programs and portfolios.

Keys to the House: Unlocking Residential Savings With Program Models for Home Energy Upgrades

Author(s): Grevatt, J; Hoffman, I; Hoffmeyer, D | Abstract: After more than 40 years of effort, energy efficiency program administrators and associated contractors still find it challenging to penetrate the home retrofit market, especially at levels commensurate with state and federal goals for energy savings and emissions reductions. Residential retrofit programs further have not coalesced around a reliably successful model. They still vary in design, implementation and performance, and they remain among the more difficult and costly options for acquiring savings in the residential sector. If programs are to contribute fully to meeting resource and policy objectives, administrators need to understand what program elements are key to acquiring residential savings as cost effectively as possible. To that end, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) sponsored a comprehensive review and analysis of home energy upgrade programs with proven track records, focusing on those with robustly verified savings and constituting good examples for replication. The study team reviewed evaluations for the period 2010 to 2014 for 134 programs that are funded by customers of investor-owned utilities. All are programs that promote multi-measure retrofits or major system upgrades. We paid particular attention to useful design and implementation features, costs, and savings for nearly 30 programs with rigorous evaluations of performance. This meta-analysis describes program models and implementation strategies for (1) direct install retrofits; (2) heating, ventilating and air-conditioning (HVAC) replacement and early retirement; and (3) comprehensive, whole-home retrofits. We analyze costs and impacts of these program models, in terms of both energy savings and emissions avoided. These program models can be useful guides as states consider expanding their strategies for acquiring energy savings as a resource and for emissions reductions. We also discuss the challenges of using evaluations to create program models that can be confidently applied in multiple jurisdictions.

Implications of Cost Effectiveness Screening Practices in a Low Natural Gas Price Environment: Case Study of a Midwestern Residential Energy Upgrade Program

April 12, 2013 Implications of Cost Effectiveness Screening Practices in a Low Natural Gas Price Environment: Case Study of a Midwestern Residential Energy Upgrade Program Ian Hoffman, Merrian Borgeson and Mark Zimring Executive Summary With the proliferation of statewide energy savings targets and other policies favorable to energy efficiency, savings from utility customer-funded energy efficiency programs could rise to offset much of annual load growth by 2025 (Barbose et al 2013). For these increased savings to occur, however, nearly all of these programs must pass screening for cost effectiveness. Some program administrators and state regulators are finding that conventional analyses, which only consider a narrow set of energy-savings related efficiency program benefits, are now resulting in some natural gas efficiency programs failing their cost-effectiveness criteria in the new low natural gas price environment. Regulators are considering whether to scale back or terminate gas portfolios in at least four states (WA, OR, ID, NM) because of cost-effectiveness concerns. Stakeholders in several regions of the country have asked LBNL to help assess alternatives to reducing the pursuit of energy savings in their regions. We address these requests by producing two working papers: one exploring cost-effectiveness screening policy implications of low to moderate natural gas prices, and a second assessing some of the values that policymakers may take into account in weighing the pros and cons of ending natural gas efficiency programs. In this policy brief, we lay out the challenges that low gas prices pose for cost effectiveness of an electric-gas efficiency program and portfolio. We then quantify options available to regulators and administrators who want to evaluate the tradeoffs among multiple policy objectives. A multi-measure, residential energy upgrade program in the Midwest is used as a lens to explore the implications of common and emerging cost-effectiveness policies in the context of low prices for natural gas. We illustrate the results across a range of cost-effectiveness screening options, including different discount rates, levels of test application, various benefit-cost tests, and the inclusion of non-energy resource benefits. While valuing cost effectiveness is a product of many choices regarding inputs and methodologies, this policy brief concentrates on several key issues that are likely to be common across most market and regulatory contexts: Funding Acknowledgement: The work described in this report was funded by the National Electricity Delivery Division of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability under Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Contract No. DE-AC02-05CH11231. This document is a part of LBNL’s Clean Energy Program Policy Brief series. These policy briefs highlight emerging program models, important issues that programs face, and how these issues are being addressed. To join the email list to receive briefs and papers from this series, please click here. Please direct questions or comments to Ian Hoffman (ihoffman@lbl.gov).