Orange County NC Website
Browse       Search
24.Please describe any avoided financial costs or savings related to the project and over what <br />period of time those costs will be avoided/reduced. <br />A reasonable expected lifetime for a heat-pump water heater is about 15 years. During <br />this time if the heat-pump water heater replaces an electric water heater the expected savings <br />in the utility bill is $360/year – if the heat-pump water heater replaces a gas water heater the <br />expected savings in the utility bill is $104/year. These savings assume about 65 gallons per day <br />of hot water is used by the household, the cost of electricity is $0.10/kwh, and the cost of <br />natural gas is $0.90/therm. <br />25.Does your project accelerate or expand on existing programs that already show positive <br />impact? <br />This program is carefully designed to utilize the program infrastructure pioneered by the <br />Orange County Home Preservation Collaborative. The existing home repair and weatherization <br />programming, and the shared intake and assessment process that under-girds it, provide this <br />program with a pipeline of qualified homeowners, a system for evaluating and prioritizing <br />projects, and a model for sharing resources to allow multiple agencies to invest in repairs in a <br />comprehensive, efficient way. So, while this is a new program, it is an expansion of services <br />within this existing framework. <br />26.Does your project also take advantage of other funding sources? <br />This project does not have a large percentage of matching funds but we have identified <br />a couple of key sources of funding leverage we expect to utilize. <br />The first source is an existing rebate program with Duke Energy; this program is <br />designed to provide owners with a $350 rebate for installing an efficient heat-pump water <br />heater. We have shared this program proposal with Duke Energy, and they have expressed full <br />support. We plan to treat Duke rebates as program income. If we receive the rebate for all 30 <br />homes, we could serve an additional three households. <br />The second source is the existing work of the Orange County Home Preservation <br />Coalition (OCHPC). The group has secured funding from various sources to help support the <br />process involving application intake, home assessment and shared work write up. This has <br />created the pipeline of evaluated, prepared projects that allow this program to very efficiently <br />identify candidates for water heater upgrades. The OCHPC cost of assessment per home <br />is about $500. Typically a project with a specific intervention like this requires assessment of <br />3-4 homes to identify an appropriate client. Thus, on average, it takes about $2000 for <br />assessment to select and prepare a client for this project. However, since we have built this <br />project upon the existing OCHPC framework, we are only budgeting $200 for assessment per <br />home. <br />27.Would your proposed project help you to take advantage of funding from other sources <br />besides this grant in the future? <br />At this time, we do not have other sources of funding identified that would replace the Climate <br />Action Funding that Orange County has made available. The leadership that Orange County is <br />exercising in this space is exceptional, but that means there are not large numbers of funders <br />working on these issues directly – yet. That said, we are pursuing funds to assist with beneficial <br />P.O. Box 8181 * Hillsborough, North Carolina 27278 <br />Telephone: 919 245-2626 <br />DocuSign Envelope ID: 674071D6-B48A-4209-80A1-FCDFB6EDB134