The URI Cooperative Extension Energy Literacy Initiative (CEELI) has established an “Efficient Housing for All” Community of Practice (EHACoP) to function as a venue for issue identification and analysis, idea exchange, and solutions related to nonparticipation in income eligible services for home energy efficiency. The EHACoP will launch in 2025 and focus on the topic of residential energy efficiency. The effort is validated by multiple governmental organizations working in adjacent will elevate solutions to prevalent energy equity-related issues in RI. The EHACoP will engage those with lived experience and expertise in energy efficiency policy and planning and public health, including income-eligible ratepayers, renters, landlords, community-based health workers, policymakers, government officials, students and advocates. Participation from two key groups – community-based workers at the intersection of environmental and human health, and Rhode Island residents with high energy burden will be key to this effort. 

This work is made possible with support from the Rhode Island Energy Efficiency Council.

Issue

An increase in savings on heating and cooling costs through the completion of weatherization projects leads to lower energy burdens and healthier indoor air quality for families. In under-resourced communities, this effort also leads to a more equitable distribution of resources to ratepayers. Income eligible energy efficiency programs continue to suffer from nonparticipation and pre-weatherization deferral issues. These are complex problems that are well defined through non participant studies – Participation & Multifamily Census Study (2022) and Nonparticipant Market Barriers Study (2022) – but the needle hasn’t moved despite the work that has been done thus far to raise awareness around barriers to participation. Funding from the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP), Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), and RI Energy is braided annually to fund weatherization projects – 1,269 homes in 2022 and 1,298 homes in 2023 in Rhode Island.

Collaboration

The URI Cooperative Extension Energy Literacy Initiative (CEELI) works with strategic partners to improve access to information for consumers, professionals and policymakers, most recently around energy efficiency for the home, for all. A recent focus of this work has been to strengthen the relationship between the University and organizations working with communities to improve quality of life; this effort has led to collaboration with the RI Health Equity Zone Initiative (HEZ). In a short period of time, with support from HEZ leadership, URI has built relationships a new community of partners, including public health experts, community-based Comprehensive Action Agencies and HEZ workers who interact directly with our most vulnerable Rhode Islanders regularly, and most importantly, with those who live in the communities that are traditionally underserved. Through this ongoing funded partnership with the RI Energy Efficiency Council (EEC), awareness of the inextricable links between public health and home energy efficiency are increasing.

Project Team

The Cooperative Extension Energy Literacy Initiative (CEELI) team is composed of Extension staff and students with varied backgrounds and expertise in facilitation and education. The 2025 team is composed of Nina Lima, a junior studying Economics and serving as the Feinstein Energy Literacy Fellow, Nina Lima, as well as two Extension staff members, Kate Hardesty and Kevin Drumm (pictured l-r).