TALES FROM THREE STATES: SOUTH CAROLINA
THE PROJECT On-bill financing for home energy upgrades THE PLACE:
Aiken, S.C. THE SAVINGS:
$1,240 per house per year WHAT MADE IT NECESSARY:
High power bills exacerbating poverty WHAT MADE IT POSSIBLE:
A new state law allowing on-bill financing, and an early loan from the U.S. Department of Agriculture
Cutting Watts & Fighting Poverty with Home Energy Savings Sheila Winburn earns less than $16,000 a year as a manicurist in the central South Carolina town of Aiken. In recent years,
during the coldest months of winter, she has paid up to $650 a month to heat her small, drafty mobile home.
Winburn has coped by economizing on food, by leaning on relatives, and, for
the past several years, by going without
health insurance. But in the fall of 2012,
MIKE COUICK CEO of Electric Cooperatives of South Carolina HELPED LAUNCH “HELP MY HOUSE,” AN ON-BILL LOAN TO WEATHERIZE HOMES.
she got a break. A new program, managed
by her local electricity co-op, offered to cut Winburn’s bills in
half by making her home more energy efficient. The best part?
Winburn didn’t have to pay a dime. All costs to retrofit her home will be paid with future energy savings. “I was really excited
when I heard about this,” Winburn says. “It’s going to change everything.”
About 17 percent of South Carolina’s residents live in poverty – one of the highest rates in America.79 Many of them, like
Winburn, are trapped by out-of-control energy bills that demand up to fifty percent of their income, forcing them into cruel daily choices: heat or medicine, air-conditioning or food.
Mike Couick, CEO of the Electric Cooperatives of South Carolina, the state’s largest electric distribution system, understood that homeowners like Winburn could never have afforded to pay
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