DENVER — On December 31, the Energy Efficient Home Improvement tax credit will expire.
"We had a record interest in flow from customers around Colorado who wanted to take advantage of that tax credit. It's $2,000 so, you know, it's a significant amount of money," said Sean Kuusinen, General Manager of Elephant Energy.
The company helps homeowners make electrification upgrades to their homes, and assists them in identifying rebates and incentives to cut the cost.
"Some homeowners can get up to $20,000 depending on the combination of projects that they're doing between Xcel and the HEAR rebates," Kuusinen said.
HEAR stands for Home Electrification and Appliance Rebates. It was recently launched in addition to the Home Efficiency Rebates (HER) for Colorado residents.
"These new federal funds that are flowing through Colorado, it's now up to $8,000," he said.
The programs are income based.
The rebates can be used on projects like adding a heat pump to a home.
"Most homes in Denver use a furnace. That uses natural gas that's piped into your home and burns that gas to create heat that's then blown through your house," said Kuusinen, "Anytime you burn something, we always lose a little bit of the energy that's in that thing. With a heat pump, we're not actually burning anything. We're just moving heat from one place to the other using some electricity and then using a fan to blow that heat through your home. So it's about three or four times more efficient than a furnace."
He advises consumers to research which rebates they might be eligible for and stack them on top of each other if possible.
The Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies offers a free program finding tool to track down which rebates a customer is eligible for.
Click here for the Colorado Energy Savings Navigator.
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