 on. Good afternoon. Good morning. Good evening. From wherever you're joining us, a warm welcome to you. My name is Jane Cohen. I'm a senior analyst here at the International Energy Agency, working on our people-centered and inclusive clean energy transitions team. The topic of today's webinar is really, really central to how we are seeing our work here at the IEA. We talk a lot about the clean energy transition and all of the opportunities and benefits that will be provided for people. But really, unless clean energy is affordable and accessible for everybody, regardless of their income, we really have failed as policymakers. But policy design can be quite complex, and we don't always get the outcomes that we're looking for. And as a former policymaker myself, I know really how hard it can be to design clean energy programs in ways that are accessible and affordable for everyone. To support our work on this at the IEA, we are doing really targeted work on affordability. And just a plug out there for folks, I know there's a lot of expertise. If you have data on this that you think would be interesting, if you have case studies, if you have thoughts on how you think we should be looking at this, please don't hesitate to share it with us. For us, really looking at affordability, again, is very, very central to how we are putting forward our work on an inclusive, fair and people-centered clean energy transition. So really kind of kicking off this work at this stage for us is this workshop today on bridging the gap for inclusive transitions, clean energy programs for low-income households. I'm very excited now to listen and to learn from our four experts who all have really deep policy knowledge on designing these kinds of programs for low-income communities. So we have a speaker from Ireland, we have one from the United States, we have one from Mexico, and one from Canada. So I'm hoping and I'm looking forward to really getting a sense of how different programs targeted for different kinds of communities have been effective, what kinds of challenges people have encountered while trying to implement these programs, how policymakers have really gotten the support that they need for these kinds of programs and what the outcomes have been. So we're going to start with Conor Hannafy. Conor is currently the Energy Poverty Program Manager at the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland. He's been there for over 16 years, so definitely comes with a lot of experience. He previously worked as a program manager of the deep retrofit pilot program and before that as the program manager for building energy rating and accelerated capital allowance programs. So obviously a lot to share from his many years of experience. So Conor, please go ahead and just tell us a little bit about the work that you've been doing. Yeah, so thanks for the invitation to the workshop and I'm delighted to be participating and to listen to other thoughts as well. So I'm working with the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland and we're funded by the Department of Environment, Climate Action, Climate and Communications and SEI, the Sustainable Energy Authority focus on three primary areas, citizens and communities, business, public and transport, research and policy and insights. And my particular role currently is focused on the Energy Poverty Program. So within our national retrofit directorate, we provide a suite of programs to address all housing retrofit needs. So that includes individual measures and one-stop shop services and the fully funded energy upgrade program, which is the focus of this event and so I have been involved considerably with the design of these programs and farming and policy. And that's, I suppose what I'd say is that our programs have evolved over time and have evolved through wide engagement with all stakeholders including those we're impacting through our grant program. So while we have a suite of programs, they each have a specific focus and now that they're the programs that I'm happy to talk about today. Connor, I'm going to go a little off script here. Can you give us a little more context? I mean, when you think about energy poverty in Ireland, I mean, can you just kind of explain what the context for that is or what percentage of the population would be considered in energy poverty and sort of what the approaches have been for addressing that? Yeah, I suppose I can cover that as we go through this. There is work through our energy poverty action plan, which encompasses a number of strands of how energy poverty is dealt with and that covered meeting the cost of energy, the energy efficiency, research and governance and communications. So what I would say is that with some research carried out that would show potentially 25% of people in this and that's quite, but again, I think there have been a number of influences over the last number of years and it probably draws out the dynamic nature of this with regard to the geopolitical situation and the impact on fuel prices. So in Ireland, we've, most of the program that supports people in receipt of fuel allowance to our Department of Social Protection, there is particular funding provided to applicants, which means tested and and they receive payment and on foot of that payment, then they also attract the energy efficiency measures. So it would range from fuel allowance to job seekers allowance, working family payments, one pair of family payment, domiciliary care allowance, disability allowance, and this has been evolved over time. But what I would say is that the fully funded energy program, the energy poverty program is primarily or at least the applications we receive is primarily related to fuel allowance and supporting those most in need. Well, this actually goes into my question for you because I saw that you recently, well, your team recently put out a report Healthy Homes Ireland and in that there's a real focus on the need for various agencies to be coordinated. And just in that list of the different approaches to energy poverty, I mean, you can already, I mean, I'm just imagining all the different agencies that that could be part of that. You know, if this is such a cross cutting issue, it's not surprising that it involves, you know, multiple different different agencies. But I'm wondering from your perspective, if you can talk about why that coordination is so important and what some of the challenges in achieving it are? Yeah, sure. So like we would engage quite broadly with various stakeholders. Yeah, in the Healthy Homes Ireland initiative, which was led by the Irish Green Building Council, it encompassed a number of stakeholders and quite broad from regulatory policy, indoor air quality, you know, the training in colleges and universities. And I suppose what we see and the importance of establishing synergies. So essentially, we're trying to present a value proposition to those most in need. And what we see is through our broad engagement is that each entity is providing something quite particular to the applicant. And in this particular review around Healthy Homes, it was to join the dots really between the insights from the university regulation relative to ventilation in retrofit and the importance of sharing awareness, educating and upskilling. So we also see the supply chain playing a key part in this in that there are many players and many actors that will influence our customers. And it's to have that joined up thinking with regard to the offering occupant empowerment. So though living in the homes, do they know how to use the technology to know the importance of indoor air quality? Obviously, the knowledge across all actors is very important. Regulation obviously plays a key role. And then without funding, it doesn't happen. And I think there's funding particularly for those most vulnerable. But what I'd say is that I think leadership across all the entities and joined up thinking are very important to join the dots on the synergies and present them in a very simple way to people. Thank you, Connor. And I think this question of how to align and coordinate interventions that can have multiple positive benefits, for example, housing interventions that can tackle energy efficiency, lead remediation abatement, asthma triggers, et cetera, mold. That's something that I know a lot of policymakers are thinking about. And so I would also just ask others on the panel to talk about that if they would like. Now I'm going to go over to Catherine Klinger. Catherine is currently the Executive Director of the New Jersey Governor's Office of Climate Action and the Green Economy, where she manages the governor's portfolio on climate, energy, and environment. And as part of that, she also leads the policy on all of the low-income programs. Before that, she was a long-time worker at the Green and Healthy Homes Initiative, where she worked on interventions around housing, clean energy, and other health and safety issues in the home. So Catherine, if you could talk a little bit about the work that you're doing and specifically how you think about it in terms of access and affordability for clean energy for low-income households. Absolutely, Jane. It's my pleasure to do so. And thank you to IEA and to you for convening this important discussion today. So as you mentioned, I had up the work of the Office of Climate Action and the Green Economy in Governor Murphy's office. And I think it's maybe helpful to set just a bit of context about the work that we do in what we call the O-Cage in Governor Murphy's office. And so, as folks are familiar with at the federal level for the first time in the United States, we're seeing really focused investment and policy around climate action. But for a long time, prior to even what we're seeing at the federal level in the United States right now, Governor Murphy has been deeply engaged in setting a bold climate action agenda for New Jersey. And so part of that is really doing a lot of the underlying planning and analysis to understand what are the sector-specific emissions reductions and clean energy deployment targets that New Jersey needs to meet in order to make an impact on the climate crisis. We're a coastal state. And so many of our frontline communities in New Jersey are not only on the front lines of the impacts of the climate crisis, but also literally on the front lines for impacts like flooding and other types of impacts of severe weather. And so we think a lot about sort of the broad approach to equitable clean energy deployment and climate action in New Jersey. And that includes not just the actions that we're taking in our housing sector to reduce emissions, but also building out diverse and inclusive opportunities in the growing green economy in our state and ensuring that those opportunities accrue to residents of our frontline communities. So just a couple of examples and Jane, you sort of flagged some of this in your intro, but we are seeking to achieve an 89% emissions reduction in the housing sector in New Jersey. And so what that means is really rapid and widespread deployment of cleaner and greener technology in buildings, particularly in residential buildings in the state. However, we also are in the midst of a deep housing affordability crisis and housing quality crisis in New Jersey. Much of our housing is very old, much of it is rentor occupied, about a third of it is rentor occupied. And this housing not only is in need of a transition away from fossil fuel building heating systems, but also in deep need of repairs in order to improve, as Connor was saying, indoor air quality to remediate hazards like lead and to make an impact on the downstream health effects of poor housing quality. And also to make that housing more efficient in order to bring down energy costs for families that are living there. And so we've strived to take a holistic approach to that emissions reduction work in buildings. And again, we've done a great deal of planning and analysis about how to achieve that. And are sort of in the beginning of the implementation phase now in New Jersey, but programs like Comfort Partners, which is an initiative that is co run by our large energy utilities and our government, our Board of Public Utilities in the state really seeks to identify housing that's in deep need of these sort of retrofits and repairs and kind of do a one stop shop to that, to meeting all of those housing needs holistically. So doing energy efficiency work that improves the envelope at the same time that we're installing high efficiency heat pumps at the same time that we're remediating lead and improving ventilation to improve indoor air quality. So we see this sort of deep intensive investment, intensive approach to addressing the issues in our housing stock as sort of core to our equitable approach to a transition to cleaner and greener solutions. And I'll just give one more example if I may, which is kind of more on the clean energy deployment side, which is our community solar program. So folks may be familiar with this model, but this is a model where solar developers are encouraged to build large scale solar on previously unused or municipally owned land and then to, to deploy that energy or allow that energy to be distributed to low to moderate income households who can benefit from cleaner and greener technologies and reductions on their on their energy costs. And so this community solar model really removes the upfront barriers of having to have access and upfront capital to be able to install rooftop solar for low to moderate income households in New Jersey and allows folks to take advantage of that clean energy sort of without those upfront upfront costs. We're iterating on this program. So we've recently passed legislation that allows for certain census tracts within municipalities to opt out of community solar, meaning that if you live in an overburdened census tract, you will automatically be enrolled for participation in the community solar program unless you opt out. So that's just a much more, you know, sort of again low barrier, more equitable approach to deploying this cleaner and greener technology in our municipalities. And we're, we're working through again, how we're going to implement that, but there's been tremendous interest in that program and in that model in New Jersey. Thanks, Catherine. I was actually going to ask you, and this is against, I mean, I would appreciate hearing all the panelists perspectives on in some of these interventions like community solar that you mentioned, I mean, how does the word get out about something like that? I mean, I assume, you know, people are are perhaps not completely trusting of someone who kind of comes to their door and is pitching them on a program. And, you know, Connor, I was thinking about this as well when you were talking, you know, it's not surprising that some of our, you know, low income communities may not have full trust in government programs or, you know, certain schemes that that they just don't necessarily have a lot of information about. So Catherine, I know this isn't the question that I prepared for you, and I'll come back to that. But if you could just kind of talk quickly about in the situation like that, and I know you just mentioned that now it's opt out. But before that, and with comfort partners, etc. What is the mechanism for communicating with with folks about this and what is the mechanism for kind of trust building around that? Yeah, it's such an important question, Jane. And it has been a significant barrier to some of our efforts in New Jersey. I think the answer to that is that oftentimes the messenger cannot be government. It has to be aligned and deep partnerships with trusted community based organizations and trusted community partners who can get the word out. And much of the success that we see in these programs is actually by sort of good old fashioned word of mouth. Where people who have received the services and had a good experience, which is, you know, critical right to building that trust, then tell their neighbors and their family members and their friends and we sort of see the word get out that way. But I do think those partnerships are central to making sure these types of services are successfully to polite in communities. Thanks for that. And again, you know, if other folks have thoughts on that question, please feel free to jump in on that. I agree with Catherine. I think the trusted advisors and also the leveraging established instruments in regulation also lead to trust and trust is something that's built over time. So our European performance certificates, for example, adds trust and the actors in that regard of building energy rating assessors. Would you need that network on the ground of sustainable energy communities, which SEI provide to inform local local people in the community of the benefits. And I think part of that, too, is the supply chain. The supply chain plays a large role, particularly when it's local supply chain of trusted actors in the community and getting the good news stories out. I think we need to, you know, when we focus on the works and the story needs to be told. Then once the works are done and that can lead to an understandable community that can will engage over time. Yeah. Thanks, Connor. And Lilliana, I see you. I see you nodding your head there. So I'm actually going to skip right over to you. So let me do a quick intro. And then if you want to answer, if you want to jump in on that question and then we can go back, that would be great. So I'm very happy to be joined today by Lilliana Campos Ariaga. She's the director of projects for energy efficiency and renewable energy at GIZ in Mexico. She's worked on energy efficiency in buildings and particularly focused on refurbishing social housing across a number of countries with various partners and recently concluded a project on energy efficiency rehabilitation of social housing in Mexico. So I know also Lilliana, your experience is not just in Mexico, but you've had experience with this kind of in multiple, multiple different contexts. But I would be very curious to hear kind of your thoughts on this question of communicating programs to the targeted communities and households. And then we'll get back to our regularly scheduled programming. Yes, thank you, Jane, and I'm just for the opportunity to be part of this conversation. And I actually was nodding on Catherine's intervention because this mouth to mouth word to word spreading the news is something that we detected as well to be like a winning point or a turnaround for engaging the people in getting renovating their homes. So, yes, and also you also touched the thing about how are you going to be opening your door to a person that is going to be telling you about the solar community program in Mexico? This is particularly a concern with the security issue, so who is knocking on my door and talking about energy efficiency. So I would just like to say that, well, GIZ has a long story of collaboration with Mexico promoting sustainable energy and social housing. So back in 2010, GIZ had provided technical support for designing the first sustainable housing NAMMA. Later in 2012, along with IDB, we provided technical support for its implementation. So the sustainable NAMMA was focusing on new construction, so social housing, new construction that was mainly designed, constructed and commercialized by developers. And perhaps I here would like to highlight the two main ways that we have of producing social housing in Mexico. So the first way is the commercial production of social housing, where the end user basically just go to the market and see what a housing is available. But the developer decides the land, the location, the orientation, the design, the building materials and so on. The second way of producing is that that's what we call self-produced house, where the end user, the people that will actually be living on the spaces, they decide on the land, on the location, on the building materials, the design and also the time frame of the construction and the financing means. So they may or may not be involved in some type of the construction themselves. So most of the financial and technical cooperation program have been designed targeting the commercial way of production of the social housing. And for those joining us from other countries, I would like to clarify that when we are talking about social housing in Mexico, we are referring to houses that are around 55 to 80 square meters and that are around in an average cost of $60,000. So this is the kind of houses that we are talking about. And building upon the experiences of these new housing or new construction programs. In 2018, the German Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development, the BMZ Commission, GI said to support the Mexican government with the implementation of this refurbishment of social housing program, the Decate Yves or the Decate Vivienda, as we call it in short. So this program, the Decate Vivienda closed in September of this year and was targeting existing homes. So existing homes is a home that is people actually occupying the spaces in a regular manner. So therefore any intervention to improve energy efficiency or quality of life or indirect conditions, as Conor said, should be totally co-created with them. They are going to be deciding what is going to be happening on their spaces. So basically the question was how to better support these families to make informed decisions, to renovate their houses in a way that their needs are satisfied, but at the same time, they can save energy and improve the long-term living conditions. So how do you do that? And raising awareness, and this is the touching back to the communication aspect, was key. Making information regarding energy efficiency solutions, biochemically science available for the end user was key. And I am very proud to say the Mexican government is very clear on the importance of putting people at the center of the clean energy transitions. So as a response, the Secretary of Agrarian Land and Urban Development, SEDATU, with GIZ support launched the web portal, the CDE Construye. So I will put the link on the chat later, but this at the CDE Construye is hosting information for the end user, but information that will answer critical questions. So where do I find a technical system to build my house? Where can I find the right construction materials for me? What can I do if I am too cold or too hot in my house? What financing options do I have? And additionally, we spread this content over the social media, YouTube and Facebook mainly. So the last report that I had is that around 30.5 million people have been interacting with the content in all of these three platforms since 2021 when it was launched. So this is something that really makes sense for them. So finding the answers to common questions. Let me just ask you a follow up on that. I mean, I think web communication and a portal, on the one hand, seems like a great way to reach a lot of people, but on the other hand, if you don't know about it or you don't have easy access to something like that, it can also be a challenge. So just even taking a step further back, how is that being communicated to people and how do people kind of take that first step towards even knowing that this is an option? It's just what Catherine said, it's mouth and mouth. So with the help of extensionists and people like Habitat for Humanity that are really on the ground in the territory, they started spreading the word. And of course, we coupled that with physical and in-ground workshops to make available this information. And the great thing is that mostly everyone has now a smartphone on their hands. So this is quite a good way to spread the word and then have the information actually in your hand. Thank you. And there's a lot that I'd like to follow up there, but for right now I'm going to go to our fourth and final speaker, Jean-Clement Chonnier. Jean-Clement has been working at the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources of Canada for almost 10 years. Today he is the Executive Director for Information Management and Technology, Information Technology, Policy and Programs, and was previously Director General for Portfolio Management and Corporate Secretariat and Director of Digital Communications. Now I know Jean-Clement, you're going to talk about the Oil to Heat Pump program. And I think it would be great if you can just tell us about the work that you've been doing and what that program is. Absolutely. Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here today with my other colleagues from around the globe. So I'm here also today as the Executive Director for the Greener Homes Division, which delivers these programs to Canadians. So great conversation so far. The Oil to Heat Pump program in relationship to this conversation is aimed at Canadians who are basically heating their home with oil and are at low immediate income. The thinking here is we're targeting homeowners who are most vulnerable. Oil heating is the most polluting. It's also the most expensive and the most unpredictable form of heating that we have here in terms of actual heating costs. It's a cold country. It is critical for us to provide Canadians with affordable energy. And in home heating, space heating accounts for about 98% of the greenhouse gas emissions from the residential sector. So decarbonizing home heating is critical for us in our objectives to meet our climate change goals. The Oil to Heat Pump program actually came about quite rapidly. It was announced in the federal government's fall economic statement in 2022. So November 2022, it was pre-launched within three months and officially launched on April 1st, 2023. It is delivered either by the federal governments or in collaboration with our provincial governments. So provincial governments actually, some of them already had similar types of programming already in play in certain provinces. And the principle at play is that for citizens, it doesn't make sense to have to knock on different levels of governments to get funding. So it's a one-door approach, one-stop to get all government funding, whether it's provincial or federal. That's the principle. And that's in order to make it easier for Canadians to access funding. The program in the vast majority of cases is fully digitally delivered. And the principle is that it is aimed at replacing oil-fired heating with an energy-efficient electric heat pump, which basically reduces greenhouse gas emissions, provides predictability, and reduces the cost of heating people's homes. We do means-tested. So every participant is means-tested. We verify that they are at low and immediate income. And it's front-loaded because one of the major obstacles in heat pump production is the upfront capital cost. So in order to address that issue, we provide the subsidy to Canadian homeowners ahead of the heat pump installation. And then we will verify that said work has been accomplished. So in terms of the national delivery mechanism, Canadian homeowners apply online, provide the information, provide us with a quote, so on and so forth. And then within 48 hours, typically it will be, if they meet all the criteria approved for the subsidy, and we'll be mailed a check with the amount. Now in areas where the federal government provides the program, we provide a subsidy of about 10,000 Canadian dollars to Canadian homeowners. We have estimated the average cost of a transition from oil to heat pump at 18,400, so a significant amount. In areas and provinces where we co-deliver with our provincial colleagues, the federal government increases the federal funding per household to up to 15,000 Canadian dollars, provided the province also puts in an additional $5,000. So in those areas of the country, we are actually in a territory of a free oil to heat pump transition. The program aims to transition between 50,000 to 60,000 Canadian households from oil to heat pump across the country. Now, I think has been good so far, so we're seeing a very positive response. So things are working very well. And so this has been, we've been running this for about almost a year. Update has been pretty constant. And then we're really focusing also on that specific demographic. So these are communities, these are recipients that are most vulnerable because they're not as wealthy. They also face non-financial barriers in many cases. So we're trying to streamline the process as much as possible. We're also trying to find some flexibilities and find some additional ways of delivering the program. So we're looking at the possibility of doing some contribution agreements with some third parties who could do turnkey service in certain vulnerable communities, for example. We know that certain demographics, and this has been said already, have less trust in government. So maybe if we find some partners that are local at the community level who are equipped to do these transitions in the turnkey fashion, but also have a more close, a closer relationship to these communities, we can get better results. So we're looking at that definitely. And a suite of additional flexibilities. Obviously, in context, we're also very cognizant that that that we will also want to make sure that indigenous communities across the country that participate in this. And we have also built in this suite of additional flexibilities for these indigenous communities to make sure that they can take advantage of these. And in often cases, working with our provincial colleagues is very beneficial because they have a closer relationship to their constituents. So as an introduction, I guess I would keep it at that, but happy to answer your questions. Thank you for that. And I know Catherine has a question for you and I do too. So I'm going to jump in ahead. Right. I'm going to take my privilege as the moderator and jump ahead and lie in for her and just ask. You mentioned its means tested and I'm wondering, you know, we hear a lot about, you know, burden of paperwork and having a lot to submit. And that can be, you know, an issue for people accessing these, these programs that are targeted for them. But then there's, you know, such a high burden of paperwork and kind of proof of things that it actually makes it very difficult. And I'm just wondering, since you said you have a lot of uptake on this program already, you know, is it, what is your method for means testing? Is it simple and streamlined? I think that could be interesting for those of us who are kind of thinking about this broadly. Absolutely. We deliver multiple such programs and in all our experience, and I say Joe can lead to all my friends and colleagues, you know, the three main lessons we've learned for all of these programs is make it simple, make it simpler, make it more simple, especially for the recipients. The way that means testing occurs as an international delivery model, when participants apply online in Canada, everyone has a nine digit social insurance number that identifies you as a person and the Canada, it also identifies you to the Canada Revenue Agency, which is the Cain Taxman. So, so, so when people provide their social insurance number as they register for the program within 24 hours, an automated process that runs late at night will liaise with, will communicate with the Canada Revenue Agency and get the confirmation automatically. There's no human intervention whatsoever. So, so, so again, making it very simple, making it seamless and transparent for the homeowners who apply. Thank you. Catherine, do you want to jump in with your question? Sure. Thank you so much, Jane. You know, I think we've had our eye on Canada's model for heat pump deployment, specifically because there is a lot of great uptake. And one of the things, you know, certainly the upfront capital that defrains the cost of the, you know, the investment in the initial heat pump is very important. But we're in this sort of liminal space right now in the, in much of the U.S., where we're waiting for those federal dollars to come down to be able to do the kind of point of sale upfront heat pump rebates. And so we're looking for creative solutions to start to deploy heat pumps now. And one of the things that we've heard that Canada is doing is a really simple model for financing the cost of the heat pump right on the energy bill. And I was wondering if that's something, it looks like you're nodding your head, so you are familiar with that. And if you're, if that is being done sort of strictly in the kind of middle income sector of the market, or if you've seen that type of approach work for lower income households as well. Again, all the heat pump is really targeted to low to medium income Canadians. Again, there are no real third parties in terms of the financing aspects. The federal government provides the funds in a national delivery, the federal government pays the homeowner directly in cases where we are co-delivering the program with our provincial colleagues. We provide through contribution agreement, the funding for the entire program delivery to our provincial friends who then deliver their products via their own digital means. Now, in terms of constituents, homeowners who are not in the lower to medium income bracket, we do have additional programming. We have the greener homes grant and the greener homes loan programs. These are additional programs. They're not structured the same way. The grant, for example, is aimed at paying about 25% of energy efficiency retrofit for Canadian homes. It is a large program. We're looking at about 500,000 plus people to participate. It also is not specific to heat pump. It includes building envelopes, so heat pumps, windows and doors, insulation, air ceiling, and so on and so forth. The grant can be up to 5,000 Canadian dollars. That's a bit different. It's really more designed for, again, the median and upwards bracket of income. We provide the subsidy once we have proof of retrofits completed. It's not upfront. It is, again, a fully digital user journey, but it's a bit different. In those cases, we also, in certain areas of country, have partners with utilities in order to deliver the program. In two promises, we have a utility that actually operates and operationalizes the program on the other half. We provide the actual funding for that area of the country to that utility who delivers the program according to our parameters on our behalf. Again, because they have their own program, so we combine everything together. It's the one-stop shop for the Canadian homeowner in those areas. Thank you. That's a really interesting program. I think it's just encouraging that you've had a lot of uptake, even though the program is still fairly young. Katherine, I'm going to go back to you for a minute. You've had a lot of experience, obviously, in New Jersey, but before that, you were working nationally in the United States on these issues. I'm wondering, having seen a lot of different kinds of programs, what are programs that you've seen that have been really effective? Is there something that stands out in your mind where you can say, we did this, and then this, and then this, and that was the formula? Do you have anything that you think is really a shining example of something that's been very successful in terms of targeting and having effective policies for low-income families on the clean energy side? Yeah, I think specifically in the housing space and housing energy efficiency space, one of the most successful approaches that we've seen has been to take a health-based approach to this work. Oftentimes, what that looks like is that you are combining home health visiting services, for example, specifically around asthma, that tackle and address some of the behavioral aspects of that environmental illness, at the same time that you're doing structural updates and improvements to the home environment, where you are improving the indoor air quality, improving the efficiency of the home, and also doing some of these greener and cleaner technologies. It's a holistic approach that takes a health lens to the housing environment, to the home environment, in order to really, I think, again, help to build that trust, get the foot in the door when you are talking to residents about what needs to happen with their home, and then also allows you to do some measurement of the impact of the work that you're doing from a health perspective. The advantage of that is that it also helps, in some cases, to get more healthcare dollars in the door to be able to do these types of interventions. In an environment like the U.S., where we have, I think, fewer government-based sources of resources for this type of work, you also need to tap into the healthcare system to be able to show the kind of upstream or downstream impacts of improvements to housing. That mix of home visiting and a health-based approach to housing improvements, I think we have seen be very successful in a variety of different kinds of communities and housing stocks around the country. Yeah, that makes me think of what Connor was speaking about at the beginning of our panel on the need for this collaboration between various agencies. I mean, thinking about energy interventions and health interventions, and again, the collaboration that's needed for those kinds of interventions to be really successful. Liliana, I'm going to ask you a similar question. I mean, you worked in a number of different contexts, Mexico and other countries, and curious if there's something that, again, really sticks out in your mind, kind of either in one specific place or across every place that you've worked, something that policymakers and implementers should really keep in mind as kind of best practices for having effective outcomes. Yes. Well, I think the financial aspect and the technical aspect should go hand in hand, and just, Jean-Claude just said something about subsidies for the upcoming front cost of the heat pumps. In our experience, the subsidies are always something that can get the wheel moving, but then you have to have a solid and strong mechanism when they are withdrawal, so that the program can keep moving and keep existing. We depended on the subsidies for improving sustainability in social housing, and this is something that we are currently transiting towards just doing it in a voluntary manner, and not depending on the subsidies. But it is also through that you need that for starting, making the wheel. The other thing I would like to say is that, and you've touched that on energy poverty, basically is be aware when designing the policy package of the income capacity, credit capacity of the people that you are going to be targeting. Sometimes the technological solutions are designed for achieving the maximum greenhouse gas emission reduction, but then again, the cost of implementing that at a massive scale might not be quite related with that outcome. So, bear in mind that and be to step by step, then trying to do something very ambitious that is only going to be affecting a few people that can afford the solution. That's helpful, and I think that kind of goes to this question of making policy that is actually implementable on the ground, and again, why it's so important that there are a lot of open channels with community groups and others who can help give that feedback of what's actually plausible, what's actually workable, and what's not. I want to ask our panelists now, when we talk about the clean energy transition and we talk about the potential for job growth and bringing a diverse workforce and new opportunities, we're often talking about the same kinds of populations or sometimes the same kinds of populations who we would be targeting for some of these clean energy affordability interventions. So, I'm just wondering when you're thinking about, let's say energy efficiency or heat pump installation, you're thinking about solar panel installation, do your programs or how are you thinking about kind of workforce and developing a local community-based workforce as part of that? Has that been part of your programs? Is there interest in that? I think it would be really helpful to kind of hear what some of your experiences with that have been. So, Conor, over to you to speak to that. So, I suppose Ireland's main energy poverty program is the warmer homes program. It's fully funded and it prioritizes the worst performing homes, the EF&G and the building energy rating scales of the worst performing in the oldest homes and obviously the most vulnerable. So, it's fully funded and we've seen considerable success on the program over the last number of years. So, pre-COVID, last year's expenditure relative to pre-COVID is tripled in capital expenditure with 157 million. Now, what I would say is that obviously there's been a number of benefactors from this and obviously the alleviation of energy poverty is focused on the program through energy efficiency. That's been hugely successful. Related to Catherine and John's point, this is delivered by SAI through a contractor panel. So, this has been an established panel over a number of years and our movement over the last number of years has been to broaden that panel because it is free. We pay for it and it's funded by the department on this and that has allowed the supply chain to grow. And I think one key point about this is a flow of work, reliable, predictable. So, the benefactors are seeing this and once you get a program to flow, you can turn the dials on the design, et cetera, but it must provide a flow and back to the trust point that leads to trust and supply chain engagement, which ultimately leads to the objectives being achieved, which is alleviation of fuel poverty. And I suppose there's an ongoing process on the supply chain's development of skills and capacity, but I think once you see it dependable and reliable and vision of it into the future, they will invest in it. And then it's telling that story afterwards because it's as well as the recipient of this works, it was a very powerful human story to this. The supply chain had all an equally powerful human story in the local context. So, I think the importance of investment and its reliable delivery is very important to growth. Yeah, and just to say, I mean, I think I really agree that there is this very powerful human component here. And when we can, as you put it, kind of turn the dials on the program design, and I think that's kind of the gold standard is having a program that delivers clean, affordable, accessible, clean energy that allows for workforce development and kind of a robust local supply chain of people and where it's possible, you know, goods as well. So, I like that kind of thinking of turning the dial and that policy design doesn't have to be static, that after it's kind of up and running, you can tweak it and change it once you've established that trust. Yeah, we have an energy poverty plan. We also have an energy poverty steering group. So, then monitor the impacts on the ground from a number of stakeholder impacts perspectives. And that's been very useful to turn the dial on design because it's not a static thing and it is something that needs those feedback loops to ensure the program is effective and that is measured. Thank you. And I would just ask the other panelists if they'd like to kind of weigh in on this question of workforce and thinking about opportunities for working for, you know, local populations who are also benefiting from some of these policies. If I could add something from marketing perspective, one of the key objectives of all are energy efficiency and greenhouse gas emissions reducing programming in the residential sector has also been the growth of retrofit economy and then really to send signals to the market, right? Signals that are going to basically nudge the market towards where we wanted to go. So, we have airmarked funding in our programs specifically for things like training because as the technology changes, the workforce needs to adapt. And then installing a gas furnace and installing heat pump are completely different things. It's a completely different skill set. So, if we don't have the skilled labor to support the programming, that is not going to work. So, we have considered this. We've also invested in training and upskilling for the workforce that actually doesn't necessarily install equipment but does the evaluation and the energy efficiency auditing of the residential sector. So, they go in people's homes and then do what we call an energy audit. So, looking at the energy efficiency of the homes, providing homeowners with education about how the house works as a system and then providing recommendations of what would be effective in terms of retrofitting your home to make it more comfortable, more energy efficient, save money on their heating costs, make them more comfortable and healthy and so on and so forth. So, we've invested in those areas also because without the workforce, these programs are important. Yeah, I completely agree with the other panelists in terms of both the importance of a steady flow of jobs and also comprehensive training for the workforce. I think some of the other things that we've considered or some of the challenges that we've faced, I should say, is that oftentimes the workers are not in the same communities where the jobs are. And so, a comprehensive community-based approach where residents are helping to improve the quality and the efficiency of their own housing is one approach to that. Another approach to that is to provide the kind of wraparound supports that workers need to be able to access reliable transportation to where the jobs are or where the training programs are, affordable child care to be able to access, again, those jobs and training opportunities. And the last thing I would say about that is that the program has to include a career ladder. So, energy efficiency jobs in the US are oftentimes very difficult work and not well paid, not family sustaining jobs. And so, how do you sort of create opportunities for workers to come in at an entry level in the energy efficiency space but continue to, as you were saying, Jean Clement, receive additional training and move up the career ladder and really make those long-term sustainable career opportunities? Yeah, the other thing I might add to that is, I suppose, in Ireland, there's national centres of excellence and retrofit provides free training. And sometimes the challenge can be that we have a supply chain that's very active and may not have the time to invest in training. So, I was trying to get the balance there, but I think the training riders have been very innovative in having that blend of on-site and virtual reality and augmented reality, building those technologies in to assist in training so that the supply chains can continue to develop and grow and, yes, increase knowledge and allow them to do the kind of work that needs to be done. Yeah. Yes, absolutely. I just want to touch on that. Capacity building is key to actually implement any kind of energy efficiency or renewable energy programme, but the value change that Connor mentioned is really dynamic. So, you have to be engaging the local authorities but also the end user, the architect, the designer, the workers that are actually going to be installing and maintaining the technologies. And as John said, this is always moving and always evolving, and you need to be able to keep them upskilling. And perhaps that, Catherine, could be a solution for this ladder, you know, that's going to ladder it and then you are going to be also improving your skills as the technologies also evolve. What I've noticed in the programmes is when we targeted houses that were commercially available, the people that were living in houses that had some sustainability or energy efficiency, the technologists didn't know or didn't quite know that they were living in an eco house. But when the other types of production of housing where they are more involved in the decisions were targeted, then it's something like a DIY. You love them more because you are involved on the solutions and you know that this shading device is providing you comfort and we see a greater engage of the end user with the technology in that way. That's a really, really good point because I think a lot of this is abstract for people, even if it's in their homes. I mean, just take a heat pump, for example, if you're at a, you know, dinner with 15 people and you ask them what a heat pump is, you know, you'd be lucky if one or two of them could tell you what it is. I think there is a sort of high barrier or high bar to engaging with some of this technology and kind of a hands-on approach when people are able to kind of really think about what it means for their homes and especially when there's those financial help, whether it's subsidies or incentives so that they're not putting out an upfront cost that they can't afford. It seems like that would be very important in terms of having some, you know, quote-unquote ownership over these kinds of clean energy technologies and programs. But the program that you're discussing, Lilliana, is interesting. I mean, I don't know if there's, I don't know of other examples or programs like that. I'd be curious to ask the panelists if they've heard of this, where there's, you know, the people who are going to be moving into these homes or living in these homes, you know, really have an active role in the design of the home kind of at a lower income level. I mean, I know in the United States, we have in certain places, you know, we're trying to put in certain standards around kind of low income houses, housing with, you know, certain levels of efficiency, etc., but kind of choosing, giving people the option and helping them through that process seems very interesting in terms of really driving, kind of driving that behavior change. So I'm wondering, do our other panelists, have they heard of like these kinds of programs? I suppose related to it, Jane, is probably, I think you'll have your mainstream program delivering. And I think in front of that, let's call it a working pilot. Sometimes pilots are sort of a working pilot in front that is testing the waters and is engaging on particular aspects that you want the program to develop in. So for example, on the warmer homes program, we have two pilots. One is a warm time well-being pilot, which has been very successful on the health side of the program. And also we have another pilot, which is looking at the renewables piece and developing. But as part of that, we would engage considerably, and the fact that we're driving this ourselves with our supply chain, we can engage at the survey stage with regard to suitable measures. So the survey and engagement with the homeowner provides an enormous intelligence with regard to the works and what's suitable for the applicant. So while the EPC can provide you with the technical information, it's the engagement at the survey stage and serving the house and having that discussion in the home as to what's suitable is important in regulation. Did anyone else want to jump in on that? It's hard to tell if people are unmuting. What Carly just said, I mean, homeowner education and engagement is absolutely key. Homeowners often do not understand how their actual homes work and that makes a huge difference. We want to empower homeowners to make their own decisions and for that they need to be equipped with the proper information and they must have the proper understanding. The other heatpump doesn't have this, but our grant program includes a pre-retrofit and the post-retrofit evaluation of the home. A quite comprehensive one, collecting 400 data points and we impart the user with our full report of the performance of their homes and a list of recommended retrofits within the pre-retrofit evaluation and the homeowners decide which ones they want to do because they are the custodians of their financial situation, of their family life and whatever, they know what is best for them so we do not tell them which one to do. They select from that list and that also is important for us to empower our citizens to make their own decisions. I thought Liniana's program was incredibly interesting when we're actually involving citizens in home design and selecting building materials and so on and so forth. I'm not quite sure if we're working in the market, but I find this extremely innovative so congratulations on that. No, thank you. That is exactly what you just said. On the previous program for targeting new construction homes, we just designed the energy packages, the traditional way, simulation, modeling and we calculated the energy savings and so on so the end product, the house, was just delivered to the end user and in this time, if you're retrofitting, you just said that. I mean, the home owners, they decide what's the best for them because the home is something that is very particular and very sensitive for the families. It's not quite a car because you go to a store and you see a car and you have two choices, electric or combustion and you choose within your budget, but your house is, you are slowly upgrading it and just select the lighting and the curtains and you are making it your own and the energy efficiency technology is just another decision about that, but the one that you cannot see sometimes and it doesn't look pretty, like a nice color on your wall, so actually informing these decisions is very crucial for implementing renovations and I'm happy to say that with the program, we improved the quality of more than 29,500 people and we intervene by around 7,300 homes and we calculated that we avoid around 9,000 tons of CO2, so this is working with the people and they are making the decisions. It's really inspiring and encouraging that these kinds of programs exist, that there's a lot of uptake and that the evaluation that's been done shows that they are effective and I guess the question is about scaling that and I'd ask Liliana and John just to kind of talk a little bit about the plans to scale and if you think there's challenges there, you're obviously reaching a lot of people already, but kind of thinking about these sorts of interventions that do require more upfront costs and John, when you talk about the whole home evaluation, I think that's the gold standard, but that's not a light lift, so just kind of thinking about scaling and any thoughts that either of you or other panelists have on kind of scaling some of these successful programs. When you talk about the home evaluation, you're absolutely correct, so this energy guide program, which does the home evaluation, has evaluated about 2 million homes, there are 16 million dwellings in Canada. It is not realistic to expect that our certified evaluators are going to be able to do every house in Canada. We are actually doing a modernization of that program as we speak. It was designed 20 years ago, it served various purposes, it's been very successful, but a lot has changed. Digital technology has evolved considerably. We are looking at a new iteration of that program in which will involve multiple options for homeowners, more elaborate options that are more costlier, more involved, that are not as simple, but provide you with much more information, and at the other end of the spectrum, easier, less costly versions that Canadians can also benefit from, because again, we need to democratize home labeling, energy efficiency labeling, we need to democratize this, so that not just for individual people's homes, but we want this data. We want this data, we want to apply a geospatial lens to this data to inform policy decisions going forward, so on that. In terms of scaling, I'm going to be going a bit less positive here. Decarbonizing the residential sector, bringing energy affordability throughout the country is not something that we can subsidize ourselves to. Again, 16 million dwellings, if we wanted to subsidize the carbonization, energy efficiency for $60 million homes, the money doesn't exist without. So what we are really doing again, we are nudging the market, we are sending positive signals, we are growing the retrofit economy, we are preparing the table, but we won't be subsidizing every home in Canada. I don't think there's a national government out there that has this type of money, so we can't subsidize ourselves on the position, which is an unfortunate situation, but we can have a very positive influence, and we can target that influence in most of these. Yeah, and I just want to underscore your point there, because I think using the work that you're doing through subsidization to also send those market signals, that will also help drive down prices in a way that makes them more affordable, and so kind of thinking about the program holistically like that, and what you're able to do in these different stages I think is really critical to the success of our kind of decarbonization goals generally. Lilliana, do you want to say something about scaling, and I'm realizing somehow our time is already almost up, but please, if there's anything you want to say on that topic. Yes, well, what we did is basically a combination of what Connor and Jan already said. We first launched some pilot projects to be testing the waters on how this might work, and then we stop, reflect on the findings, and with that information we support and advise Mexican government to incorporate all those lessons in the current social housing programs. So as for now, we know that one of these programs that are currently working in the north of the country, which is very hot and air conditioning is the most, and they are planning on rehabilitating around 2000 homes yearly. So I know we have like 35 million homes in Mexico, so 2000 doesn't seem like much, but exactly, and I see Jan is laughing. It's not nearly the millions that you just mentioned, but it's something that we are starting on with this new tool, also the digital tool that we launched, where as John said, the end user is going to be choosing the technologies and they are coupling it with the financing. So how much can I pay, and they select the technologies and they are basically running the program like that, and we also link this program there. Great, thank you for that. Did I hear someone trying to jump in there? I know we're just really short on time and there's so much to say here, but I just wanted to throw in the fact that as policymakers we have both sort of carrots and sticks at our disposal, and so I do think part of the key to scalability is to require or leverage private investment in the market by increasing the kinds of standards that we are requiring buildings to meet and sort of disincentivizing new investment in fossil fuel technologies and buildings, so I think that has to go hand in hand with some of the catalytic sort of market transformation work that we're doing as well. I'd agree with Katrin, and the only other point I'd add is the value proposition. So I know the International Energy Agency published paper some years ago on multiple benefits, and I think improving the information and presenting that back to the population is important as well, because why people may invest in this could be for various reasons, and health may be one of them, comfort, so sometimes it's not quite what we see, and so I think to be able to present that data, people will invest on a range of drivers. Connor, that's a great point for us to end on here. As I sort of alluded to at the beginning, this is really work, I mean obviously IA has done a lot of work on multiple benefits, this is work that we're really thinking about kind of multiple benefits of other kinds of clean energy technologies and really making the case that this is not just about emissions reductions, this is about health, it's about comfort, it's about growing the economy, and it's really important that we find the right ways to communicate that and that we have the policy successes also to really support that, and personally I feel better after the last hour and 15 minutes with the four of you, just because of all the incredible work that you're doing, and I think this kind of wide-ranging conversation really goes to show that there is this, it is very cross-cutting, and it is very important for us to be thinking about all of these different pieces, and I think everyone on this panel is really thinking about the clean energy transition in this way, and kind of particularly in regards to targeting programs for low-income households, really kind of thinking about all of the different kind of policy implications of that and how to have the outcomes that will be most beneficial for those populations. So I want to thank all of you for taking your time, this was a really great conversation, I think we could have gone on for another hour, but I will give you the rest of your day back, and thank you, and for those who are participating and listening online, thank you so much. Again, if you have kind of thoughts or ideas about this, please do not hesitate to reach out, this is a really important area for us, and if you have particularly some data or some case studies that kind of talk about this multiple benefits work, we'd be very curious to hear it and to engage on that with you, so thank you very much everyone.