With no upfront costs, this innovative financing tool makes energy efficiency affordable to all

From Nate Berg / ENSIA: North Carolina’s Roanoke Electric Cooperative is helping members bring down energy costs. Because the energy costs in this area is due to a lack of energy efficiency, the cooperative offers tariffed on-billing to help homes offset expenses like insulation and new heat pumps. The tariffed on-billing uses federal loans to pay for said expenses, and then the customer pays the tariff charge in their bill – which ends up being lower because of the energy-efficient upgrades.

Click here to read the original story.

Issue Areas:

Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation, Environment, Poverty Reduction Measures

Impact Areas:

Environmental Sustainability, Sustainable Finance

Actors:

Businesses, Government

Communities Served:

Communities Experiencing Economic Hardship, Workers

Strategies:

Easing Economic Burdens for Individuals, Increase Education / Insights Sharing, Utilizing Sustainable or Renewable Resources

Success Factors:

Business With Social Goals, Empowering People, Expanding Access, Meeting People Where They Are At, Overcoming the Big Challenges

Geographic Region:

North America

Countries:

United States

Date:

February 26, 2019

More Resources:

Organizing to Cancel Debt Fuels Systemic Change

From Cinnamon Janzer / Yes! Magazine: Occupy Wall Street ignited today’s debt cancellation movement. Groups like the Debt Collective are winning victories, canceling predatory student debt and pushing systemic reforms like tuition-free college. Though incremental, these changes are rewriting policy...

Pay-What-You-Can Farm Stands Feed Communities Against Tough Odds

From Gabriel Pietrorazio / Civil Eats: Farm stands operating on sliding-scale and pay-what-you-can models are improving access to fresh, healthy food in communities battling poverty and food insecurity. In these models, residents who can afford to pay full price are...

Conversation with Paula Daniels

Paula Daniels co-founded the Center for Good Food Purchasing, a national initiative promoting sustainable food systems, building on her work as founder of the Los Angeles Food Policy Council. With a career spanning private law and public service, she focuses...

Banks For The People

From Piper French / Noema: Public banks are owned and run by governments, and because they store money for the state instead of individuals, they can invest back into the communities they serve instead of extracting from them in the...

How the Philippines tapped on open-source to implement digital identity and improve services

From Yen Ocampo & Yong Shu Chiang / GovInsider: A national identification system called PhilSys has been rolled out in the Philippines in order to create access to social benefits and digital services. Future services may include but are not...

What if debt was written off to protect climate and nature?

From India Bourke / BBC: Debt-for-nature or debt-for-climate swaps are financial tools that allow indebted countries to refinance their debt and use the money saved to restore ecosystems and build environmental resilience. Ecuador, with the help of Credit-Suisse and the...