Anytime I’ve looked into it, energy efficient upgrades rarely pay for themselves if doing it solely for the energy savings. Requiring them would just increase the cost of home ownership. They do often justify the marginal cost increase compared to less efficient options, so if something needs to be done anyway it’s a good idea to go with the more efficient option.
Interestingly enough, Canada tends to offer a lot of grants/rebates for people to do energy efficiency upgrades to their house, but they don’t apply to rental properties. Seems like those kinds of things would be a big benefit for tenants that tend to be paying the utility bills.
I disagree with you on that. Living in Norway, the small house I bought 9 years ago used electric panel heaters, about 1000w in every room and 2000w in living room. I changed that shit out with a heat pump and small oil radiators in bedrooms.
My heating bill first few months after upgrade was nearly 30% lower than before, despite colder months (oct-nov vs feb-mars).
Given the difference in cost of electricity back then, I paid off my heat pump in 7-8 years. With recent pricing, it would be 5 years.
That’s fair. I forget energy costs in Europe are significantly higher than I’m used to (like 400% or more for electricity compared to Canada) so that does change things a lot.
Anytime I’ve looked into it, energy efficient upgrades rarely pay for themselves if doing it solely for the energy savings. Requiring them would just increase the cost of home ownership. They do often justify the marginal cost increase compared to less efficient options, so if something needs to be done anyway it’s a good idea to go with the more efficient option.
Interestingly enough, Canada tends to offer a lot of grants/rebates for people to do energy efficiency upgrades to their house, but they don’t apply to rental properties. Seems like those kinds of things would be a big benefit for tenants that tend to be paying the utility bills.
I disagree with you on that. Living in Norway, the small house I bought 9 years ago used electric panel heaters, about 1000w in every room and 2000w in living room. I changed that shit out with a heat pump and small oil radiators in bedrooms.
My heating bill first few months after upgrade was nearly 30% lower than before, despite colder months (oct-nov vs feb-mars).
Given the difference in cost of electricity back then, I paid off my heat pump in 7-8 years. With recent pricing, it would be 5 years.
That’s fair. I forget energy costs in Europe are significantly higher than I’m used to (like 400% or more for electricity compared to Canada) so that does change things a lot.