County council will consider a new law this fall that could help residents save on their home energy bills for no money down.
Sturgeon County council voted unanimously at its May 25 meeting to draw up a Clean Energy Improvement Program Bylaw for consideration this September.
Clean Energy Improvement Programs (CEIP) are Alberta’s version of Property Assessed Clean Energy – a policy meant to encourage people to make energy-efficiency upgrades to buildings to reduce costs and greenhouse-gas emissions.
Brandon Sandmaier, the county’s municipal energy specialist, told council that CEIPs help homeowners finance the often-high up-front costs of these upgrades, which can include insulation, new furnaces, or solar panels. Instead of paying for them out-of-pocket, the owner has the municipality cover the upgrade’s initial cost and repays them over time through higher property taxes. If the owner decides to sell the property before the upgrades are paid off, the costs stick with the property and are passed to the new owner.
Property Assessed Clean Energy programs resulted in local jobs, lower energy bills, and more comfortable homes, Sandmaier said. St. Albert is pursuing a $5-million CEIP initiative predicted to produce $4.1 million in energy savings and prevent about 30,700 tonnes of greenhouse-gas emissions.
Sandmaier said the county would have to pass an enabling bylaw to implement CEIP and find the money for it, which he suggested come from the Federation of Canadian Municipalities. The county would also have to do a market analysis to determine the program’s potential.
Coun. Dan Derouin said this law could help county residents who wanted to make their homes more efficient, but felt overwhelmed by the process.
Council was to receive the draft law by September. If approved, the county’s CEIP initiative could open for applications as early as January 2022.
