MO Ready To Set The PACE For Energy Efficiency
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – Missouri homeowners now can get help going green, thanks to Property Assessed Clean Energy, known as PACE. The recently passed PACE bill allows homeowners to pay for energy efficient upgrades with municipal loans that are paid back through a special property tax assessment. The assessment is passed on to the next homeowner if the house is sold. Adding insulation, putting in energy-efficient appliances and heating and cooling systems, adding solar panels or replacing windows all qualify for the financing.
Jason Hughes, clean energy coordinator for Renew Missouri, says PACE programs will save homeowners money.
“There are lots of reasons you can sign up for them, but at the end of the day, if you’re a homeowner and you’re interested in paying less for your utility bills, this is something you should definitely look into.”
Before homeowners can use PACE, their city or county government needs to go to ‘school’ to learn how to make it happen, Hughes says. Renew Missouri is holding a workshop July 16 in Columbia to educate city leaders about how to get PACE started in their community.
PACE has received support from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, as well as from utility companies, businesses and homeowners, Hughes says – partly due to the cost savings of the program, but also because it creates jobs. People go to work right away when homeowners order the work, he adds.
“The PACE program has this nice, innovative mechanism to get funds, to issue those funds and to put people to work. At the same time, if people are saving money on their utility bills, that’s money they can put into the local economy.”
PACE began in Berkeley, Calif., in 2007. Missouri is the 21st state to use PACE.
-Heather Claybrook
