Ottawa's green grants program for homeowners is running out of money faster than expected

A federal grant program that offers homeowners money to make their homes more energy efficient is running out of money faster than anticipated alarming homeowners and industry stakeholders who fear the program might end earlier than expected.

Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson confirmed the program is spending its allocated budget quickly because of high demand for home retrofit grants. Hestopped short of saying Natural Resources Canada (NRCAN) could abruptly close applications and suggested the program could be extended.

"Yes, we've actually started to exhaust the funds earlier than what we had anticipated, and that's largely a function of the popularity of the program," Wilkinson said.

The Greener Homes Grant program, launched by the federal government in 2021, provides homeowners with up to $5,000 for energy efficiency retrofits and home energy evaluations and up to $600 to help with the cost of home energy evaluations.

Homeowners must spend the money upfront and then be reimbursed. The $2.6-billion program was supposed to last until 2027, or until the funds are depleted. Some suggestthe money will run out in 2024.

Diana Birsan thought she had until 2027to apply. She said she has been delaying committing to renovations and signing up for the program as she juggles mortgage payments on her new Ottawa home.

WATCH |Ottawa resident shows CBC some needed home improvements:

Ottawa homeowner hopes Ottawa extends Greener Homes Grant

10 months ago

Duration 1:23

Ottawa homeowner Diana Birsan shows CBC the windows in her older home she hopes to replace with the help of a Greener Homes Grant. But the federal grant program is running out of money faster than anticipated. Birsan said she hopes the federal government extends the program.

"So it's a shock to me," Birsan said when CBC told her the program is burning through cash faster than planned.

Birsansaid she hoped the program would help her replace her gas furnace with a heat pump and swap out her leaky windows. Birsan saidif the program is cancelled, she and her partner may have to invest in a fossil fuel heating system.

"It would be such a shame because I would love to be more environmentally friendly," Birsan said. "But it does come down to what can I afford, what's possible with the money that we have."

She called on Ottawa to extend the program, given the large number of Canadians struggling with the cost of living.

Natural Resources Canada says more than 124,000 applicants have received funding through the national portal or co-delivery partners in Quebec, Ontario and Nova Scotia. The department has paid out over $450 million from the $2.6 billion budgeted for theprogram.

Wilkinson said heat pumps are the most popular retrofit funded by the program so far.

He left the door open to topping up the program with new funds in the next federal budget.

WATCH |What ending the Greener Homes Grantmeans for the energy efficiency industry:

Cancelling the Greener Homes Grant program would be a big change for energy auditors

10 months ago

Duration 2:32

Dylan Trebels trained to help people with their home energy retrofits. The 30-year-old left his corporate tech desk job hoping to become part of an army of registered energy auditors.

"We have a certain budgetary envelope. We have to exhaust or utilize that envelope before we can ask the minister of finance for additional money," Wilkinson said.

"Typically, the budgets happen in March or in April, but at this stage, we have money for some number of months to be able actually to continue to accept applications."

'Significant havoc in the sector'

Brent Kopperson, executive director of the York Regions's Windfall Ecology Centre, said one of his staff members attended a meeting in November with NRCAN officials and was warned the program could winddown soon.

Kopperson said the program's current plight feels like djvu. He pointed out that the previous federal government pulled the plug on a similarly popular ecoEnergy home retrofit program in 2012.

Kopperson said that retrofit programled to the emergence of new firms specializing indecarbonizing homes. History could repeat itself, he warned.

"We are in a climate emergency and we can't be putting our feet on the brakes. We need to really be accelerating the program," he said. "So to end this program prematurely without an immediate replacement would cause significant havoc in the sector."

After launching the retrofit program,the Trudeau government announced it would provide up to $10 million in contracts to recruit, train and mentor 2,000 energy auditors to advise homeowners on energy efficiency.

Dylan Trebelswas one of the trainees who went through the NRCAN program.

The 30-year-old left his corporate tech job hoping to become part of an army of registered energy auditors. Trebelscalls himself a "climate quitter" who took a pay cut and joined a movement to decarbonize homes and electrify them.

Greenhouse gas emissions from buildings accounted for 13 per cent of Canada's total emissions in 2021 about 87 megatonnes making it the third-highest source of emissions after oil and gas production and transportation. Canada has vowed in its emissions reduction plan to slash emissions from buildings by 37 per cent by 2030 and achieve net zero by 2050.

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Trebelssaid that if the Greener Homes program abruptly ends, he may not be able to continue his work.

"I've been doing this about a year now. And so to have the rug pulled out a little bit.... We knew this program was going to end at some point, but it feels a little soon," he said.

Others connected to the energy efficiency industry urge Ottawa to refrain from interrupting growth in a nascent clean tech sector that includes registered energy auditors and heat pump installers.

"All these people who entered into this sector with the hopes of a better career and livelihoods, I worry that this kind of start-and-stop funding cycles could put their livelihoods at risk," said Abhilash Kantamneni, a research manager at Carleton University's advocacy and research centreEfficiency Canada.

He called on the government to commit early to extending the program, and to other supports that could help all Canadians boost their homes' energy efficiency.

"What the government should be doing is to signal an intention for long-term policy commitment and policy certainty as a way to ... get to our climate goals and [do] so in a way that leaves no one behind," Kantamneni said.