In the last issue of The Jersey Sierran, we wrote how we added the building electrification (BE) Q&A “Ask Sean Show” to our monthly BE webinars. We also explained homeowner incentives that are becoming available for electrification through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).
The timing was fortuitous. Many of the IRA incentives for BE, electric vehicles (EVs), and solar are already in effect. Webinar viewers who became aware of them were eager to take advantage.
Our “Ask Sean Show” was a 3-month spin-off of a California-based show created by BE expert Sean Armstrong and other California activists. The NJ version of this show featured an attractive continuous-action entertainment format with multiple speakers. They responded to a surprising variety of audience Q&A topics related to upgrading homes through weatherization and electrification.
The three NJ episodes ran in July, August, and September during a summer hiatus of the show in California, and we supplied NJ-based speakers as well as data.
Half of each hour-long program used one or two NJ homeowners who shared their home heating and cooling specs, photos of appliances (e.g., furnaces, air conditioners, etc.), utility bills, and wish lists for case study evaluation and recommendations.
After reviewing these, Sean would make recommendations for products that would meet the homeowners’ needs. He also introduced innovative products that might be valuable for anyone embarking on a BE project. The other portion of the show was audience Q&A, mostly about home issues.
The series kicked off in July with a case study of our daughter’s South Brunswick home, for which Steve is overseeing the weatherization and electrification work.
In August we had two case studies—one from Cape May and the other from the far north of New Jersey in Hunterdon County. Both involved ground-source (geothermal) heat pump systems, a technology apparently rare in sunny California.
The September case study home was in Cherry Hill.
Each of the four case discussions involved very different homes with their own issues. And NJ homes (as well as the NJ climate) are quite different from those in California.
The three “Ask Sean Show” episodes were very popular with our webinar viewers. Average attendance for these three episodes was 64 versus 42 for our other monthly BE webinars this year, a 50% improvement. We attribute that to both the entertainment factor provided by Sean as host, along with his encyclopedic knowledge of BE products by manufacturer and model.
Sean’s company, Redwood Energy publishes research booklets. In his webinars, Sean relies heavily on data and photos from his 95-page pocket guide to all-electric retrofits. His NJ shows were not just educational but also entertaining and much appreciated and enjoyed by our audience. You may view any of the webinars (recordings, slides, and Q&A) at https://bit.ly/45bUPSK .
In October we returned to our previous BE webinar format and adopted Sean’s case study template. Volunteer owners described their recently upgraded home in Bergen County. Their trials and tribulations dealing with service providers stimulated lively audience participation, and we followed that up with a short overview of IRA consumer incentives.
We encourage Sierra Club members and leaders to register at https://bit.ly/3tmyd1g for future BE webinars, now held generally on the third Thursday of each month.
We think (and hope) we are starting to see a tipping point in favor of clean energy in NJ and elsewhere. There are several bills queued up in the legislature that support this transition. The bills had been on hold pending the election outcome. We now hope to join with other environmentalists in moving the legislation forward.
Meanwhile, we joined 75,000 others in New York City in September in the March to End Fossil Fuels. We have been invited to give presentations on homeowner/renter benefits of the IRA to different groups half a dozen times.
We recently became involved with an NJ AARP group working to develop or adopt tools to help consumers connect with knowledgeable heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) contractors or consultants to plan and implement electrification and efficiency improvements to their homes and take advantage of the IRA.
We have learned through our webinars that there is still a dearth of HVAC professionals who are knowledgeable and enthusiastic about electrification. There is a large population of consumers in need of professionals with up-to-date knowledge. The IRA addresses training and education programs. Our goal is to pull all levers to speed BE and clean energy.
Sean’s Pocket Guide to All-Electric Retrofits: https://www.redwoodenergy.net/research/a-pocket-guide-to-all-electric-retrofits-of-single-family-homes