Front Porch Blog
Updates from Appalachia
A power play for Virginia’s power plan
The shift to a clean energy economy in Virginia faces many obstacles — extreme mining, extreme drilling, and apparently extreme legislating. The General Assembly, after failing during session to wrest authority from the governor over the state’s compliance with the Clean Power Plan, used a budgetary ploy after session that handicaps the administration’s efforts.
Survey says … energy efficiency financing needed in western NC
Appalachian Voices recently conducted a Facebook survey in western North Carolina served by rural electric co-ops. Almost 90% of the respondents survey said they had trouble paying their electric bill. Tens of thousands of homes in this region are older and drafty, losing energy through windows, doors and roofs. Yet almost half the population is below the poverty line. A new financing mechanism for energy efficiency improvements could work wonders.
Keeping energy through the generations
“We do everything we can to keep energy,” Barbara Taylor says as she heads down the stairs to the basement of the home she has shared with her husband, Paul, in New Tazewell, Tennessee since 1980. Outside it’s a humid 78 degrees, but in the narrow basement room that houses the Taylors’ heat pump it’s cool and dry.
Announcing the Energy Savings for Appalachia webinar series
If you happened to miss our first energy efficiency on-bill financing webinar on May 11, don’t despair. You can watch the recording of the webinar, which is the first in a series describing the benefits of on-bill financing entitled “Leveraging Energy Savings: On-bill Financing as an Economic Opportunity in the Southeast.”
Big steps for Energy Savings for Appalachia
We launched our “Energy Savings for Appalachia” program in 2013 with high hopes of making home energy-efficiency improvements more affordable for more area residents. We reached a major milestone in April when Blue Ridge Electric Membership Corp. (BRE), a rural electric cooperative in western North Carolina, announced a new financing option for its members.
