A sweeping proposal

Saving energy to save money and the environment

By FRITZ MAYER

SULLIVAN COUNTY, NY — Most buildings in Sullivan County and across the country waste enough energy every day that owners could use to have them weatherized and otherwise made more energy efficient.

To help make those energy upgrades a bit easier for property owners to tap into, the New York State Legislature passed a bill in November that allows municipalities to finance projects such as weatherization and solar installations.

At the Sullivan County Government Center on December 10, Dick Riseling, co-founder of Sullivan Alliance for Sustainable Development, introduced lawmakers to a program called Sullivan Weatherization and Energy Efficiency Program (SWEEP) being developed to take advantage of the new law.

Under the plan, the county would create an agency to lend money to homeowners or commercial building owners who want to make energy upgrades. The loans would then be paid back as assessments on the buildings’ yearly county tax bill. It’s a rather complex arrangement, but it would allow property owners to avoid the initial upfront costs of energy upgrades with no cost to the county. If all goes as planned, the upgrades or retrofits would provide enough energy savings to more than cover the cost of the assessment spread out over 10 or 15 years. The assessment would be attached to the house and would be paid by the new owner if it were sold.

One such program is already up and running in Babylon, LI, and information on the program’s website ( www.thebabylonproject.org ) indicates that the average residential cost for upgrades or retrofits in the area of weatherization was less than $7,000 and resulted in reducing air infiltration into the home by 29 percent. In most cases, this was enough to cover the cost of the yearly assessments.

Riseling’s vision for SWEEP is that the project would be extended beyond weatherization to include such things as solar installations. He said the program could create 220 new jobs within the first five years of existence and produce millions of dollars in sales of retrofit products and new energy systems.

Riseling added that the program would be helpful in the effort to battle global warming because 40 percent of greenhouse gases come from buildings.