Energy efficient innovation is playing an increasingly important role in today’s building industry, and Utah builders have a unique opportunity to meet the demand for energy efficient homes. As the state will need thousands of new housing units to address its housing shortage, Governor Spencer Cox has identified this need as a priority, setting a goal to create 150,000 new housing units (including 35,000 new starter homes) by 2029. If each of these homes were built to advanced energy efficiency standards, the state would have the potential to save an estimated $4.7 billion in energy costs over a 30-year period.

To help empower the shift to energy efficient home construction in Utah, Utah Clean Energy has developed the following Low and Zero Emission Home Building Toolkit as a resource for single-family residential home builders seeking to construct energy efficient homes.

The toolkit is informed by the experiences of eight Utah home builders that participated in a Low and Zero Emission Housing Initiative project with Utah Clean Energy. Through the initiative, three local home builders — Garbett Homes, Ivory Homes, and Sego Homes — built homes showcasing the country’s highest standards for energy efficiency. Each of these three builders constructed a showcase home that meets the requirements of either the ENERGY STAR NextGen or Zero Energy Ready Homes programs. Building to either of these standards creates homes with lower energy bills, improved safety and indoor air quality, and increased resale value. Homes built to these standards are also 20% to 40% more energy efficient than typical new homes across the U.S.

Seven of the eight developers that participated in the initiative received technical and design assistance to adapt home plans to meet energy efficient standards. These adaptations have the potential to transform hundreds of housing units into emission-free homes over the next couple of years. Along with Garbett Homes and Sego Homes, technical assistance recipients included Arive Homes, C.W. Urban, J Development, Lincoln View LLC., and The Other Side Village.

Throughout the process of making alterations to home plans and constructing the three showcase all-electric homes, Utah Clean Energy collected feedback and lessons learned from the participating builders. These experiences have been incorporated into this toolkit as a resource to help other single-family residential builders as they build to low and zero emission standards in the future.

Acknowledgements:

This toolkit was made possible with support from the Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity and the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project. Technical assistance was provided by Resource Innovations. Utah Clean Energy is also deeply appreciative of the feedback provided by individuals from the participating builders (see list above) whose experience guided the development of this toolkit. Numerous home builders, HERS raters, realtors, and other construction or real estate professionals reviewed a draft of this toolkit and provided feedback to improve its usefulness and impact.