There's a handy new law to make upgrading your home to be more energy efficient easier than ever, helping you save money in the short and long term and ensuring a greener future in the process.
The scoop
In 2022, Congress passed the Inflation Reduction Act, aka the IRA, which includes many tax credits and rebates to help homeowners make greener upgrades to their homes. For home efficiency upgrades like weatherization, the IRA makes $8,000 available through the Home Efficiency Rebates program. Through the Home Electrification and Appliance Rebates program, which covers things like heat pumps and other electrified options for your homes, households can save as much as an additional $14,000.
Navigating all the options can be a little daunting, but there are programs like Rewiring America to help understand which tax incentives and rebates apply to you and locate contractors in your area to do the work (and contractors get benefits from the IRA, too).
🗣️ Do you think home heating costs are higher than they should be?
🔘 Definitely 👍
🔘 Depends on the season ☃️
🔘 Depends where you live 🗺️
🔘 No 👎
🗳️ Click your choice to see results and speak your mind
How it's working
Electrifying your home with energy-efficient appliances is a huge money saver. For example, switching to a heat pump for your heating and cooling can save you $670 annually on your bills. Heat pumps also reduce the amount of dirty energy created by furnaces, which release pollution into the air, and add to the greenhouse gas problem. Weatherization can also save $283 per year, according to the U.S. Department of Energy, helping any HVAC system work better or even reduce the need to run them at peak times.
There are other simple ways to save energy in your home through programs like Wattbuy, which analyzes your home's energy usage and offers a customized plan to make energy-friendly changes to your home, from the kinds of projects covered by the IRA to something as simple as switching to LED bulbs.
All of these changes, whether as big as remodeling your home or remembering to turn off your lights, add up to help the environment by requiring less resources and making the best use of the ones you do use.
What people are saying
Since the bill's passage, The White House reports that more than 3.4 million families saved $8.4 billion in tax credits on home energy projects. Additionally, the rebate programs are expected to save households up to $1 billion annually and support an estimated 50,000 jobs.
Alex Amend of Rewiring America told The Cool Down that the IRA is "unlocking billions of dollars more in annual bill savings" and is "one of the most significant anti-inflationary policies for families in American history."
Join our free newsletter for easy tips to save more and waste less, and don't miss this cool list of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet.
Cool Picks
