The communities of Fort Collins, Loveland and Longmont collectively own our own power plant, the Rawhide Power Station, located north of Fort Collins. Operated by the non-profit member owned Platte River Power Authority, it is one of the cleanest in the nation in terms of emissions. In addition, customers have the option of participating in a well established and growing home energy audit and rebate program, called Efficiency Works.

The utility offer home energy audits and rebates for energy efficient improvements, like insulation, whole house fans, furnaces, replacement windows and solar power. The audits costs homeowners about $60. The actual cost of the audit is $385 and is funded by the rate payers. A comprehensive energy audit takes about 2 hours and includes a comprehensive report detailing priorities for energy savings and comfort issues.

Homeowners can then use approved contractors who have received mandatory training and meet strict requirements for participation in the program. Rebates usually offset the total costs of improvements by 15 to 50 percent. Nearly every project is inspected for quality of workmanship and materials.

The residential efficiency program has performed over 500 home energy audits a year for the past five years and more than half of those homeowners have chosen an approved contractor, completed a project and received a rebate for improvements including: insulation, high-efficiency furnaces and air conditioning, whole house fans, new windows and solar panels. The program grows every year.

A great place to start learning about the cutting edge of home energy efficiency and low-carbon climate control is our website:

http://thisefficienthouse.com/energyaudits.html