Have questions about making the shift?

No, it’s a free service for eligible residents of the City of St. John’s. The City and econext were awarded funding from the Federation of Canadian Municipalities to offer the Shift Program service at no cost to residents.

This program is carried out with assistance from the Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ Green Municipal Fund, an endowment created by the Government of Canada.

The Shift Program is delivered in partnership with econext and the City of St. John’s.
This program is carried out with assistance from the Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ Green Municipal Fund, an endowment created by the Government of Canada.

Our project team has also partnered with the Windfall Ecology Centre who provides a similar energy concierge program for the Regional Municipality of Durham in Ontario.

While the Shift program’s guidance services are free, the upgrades and energy audits themselves come with costs – but we’re here to help make it more manageable.  There are some funding and financing programs available.

We are working with NLCU to offer low-interest loans for home energy efficiency renovations. We can also help you apply for available grants and rebates. Click here for available grants.

We can also connect you with independent financial advisors who are collaborating on the Shift Program, who can help you make the best financial decisions for you and your household.

It all starts with connecting you to one of our Home Energy Navigators, who will help guide you through the process of getting a Home Energy Audit for your home. From there, you will receive a customized EnerGuide Report outlining the most effective upgrades for your home.

Check out our Renovation Roadmap to see how it all fits together.

Actually, that’s totally up to you and what you decide is in the best interest of your household. Energy efficiency renovations can be as simple as blowing insulation into your attic space or swapping out windows – in which case the action of the renovation would take only a day or two. More complicated renovations, such as adding rigid board insulation to the exterior of your house or using spray foam insulation in a crawl space can take weeks or a couple of months depending on the situation.

Start to finish with our program – we estimate could take as little as a few months, up to a year or two for major adjustments to a home.

An Energy Audit is an assessment of your home that will help you understand how much energy is being used and will make recommendations on what you can do to make your home more energy efficient. 

The Energy Audit is provided by an Energy Advisor who works with a Service Organization accredited by Natural Resources Canada.  Once the Energy Audit is completed, the Energy Advisor will provide you with an EnerGuide Report for your home. The EnerGuide report gives you a scorecard for how efficient your home is and will recommend upgrades specific to your property. Generally, you do one Energy Audit before you undertake energy efficiency renovations (pre-project audit) and a second Energy Audit after your project is completed so you know exactly how much impact your renovations had (post-project audit).

Yes, there is a cost for the Energy Audit. Exact costs are set by the Service Organization. We can help you connect with a Service Organization.

FOR A LIMITED TIME – the Shift Program is offering a subsidy for Energy Audits, bringing the cost down to $99. This subsidy will remain until funds are exhausted.

That’s great!

As long as your Energy Audit was completed less than about 5 years (ideally 1-3 years) ago, our team of Home Energy Navigators can, with your permission, reach out to the Service Organization and confirm the recommended energy efficiency measures within the EnerGuide Report. From there, it’s the same process as any other program participant. If the Energy Audit was completed more than 5 years ago, that’s okay too. It may mean that you need to re-do the Energy Audit, but reach out and we can review with you.

If you’ve undertaken energy efficiency renovations without having done an Energy Audit – good for you for taking initiative to address your home’s energy efficiency! The first step in the program is then to complete an Energy Audit so you have a clear understanding of what things to do next.

It depends on your home and budget. Most upgrades fall into five key areas: insulation, windows, air sealing, heating/cooling systems, and hot water.  Your EnerGuide Report (from the Energy Audit) will recommend the most effective path forward, and we can help you prioritize from there.

Yes.

Better insulation, tighter sealing around openings, and energy efficient windows can significantly reduce heat loss, which leads to lower monthly bills and a more comfortable home. Think of it as stopping the leak of heat from your home. As your parents may have said in the winter, we’re not paying to heat the outdoors!

While heat pumps can be effective in reducing costs and offering cooling in the summer, the more cost-effective choice is usually to address insulation and windows first. Then any heat pumps you might install can be a smaller size (cost less) and will operate more efficiently because your walls are better at keeping the heat (and cool) inside.

It is important to try and reduce the amount of heat (and cool) you need by making your walls and windows hold the heat (and cool) in as best as possible.  Once your ‘building envelope’ is full of insulation, then it would make sense to look at installing a heat pump that is right-sized for your home. Putting in a heat pump that’s too big, and/or not addressing how ‘leaky’ your home is will make it more likely for your monthly bills to continue to be costly in the long run.

Solar panels actually work quite well in our province. Newfoundland and Labrador has higher rates of ‘insolation’ (energy from the sun’s rays) than e.g. Berlin, Germany, or London, UK, or Tokyo, Japan. And all of those places have strong solar economies.

Solar panels are often misunderstood. It does not have to be a clear blue sunny sky for them to operate. Solar panels do not need direct sunshine, they just need daylight. Newfoundland and Labrador has plenty of bright days even with cloud cover, allowing solar panels to work well. Solar panels are also supported by Newfoundland Power’s Net Metering Program – a program that gives you a one-to-one credit for the energy generated by your solar panels that is sent back to the grid. While the Shift Program is focused on energy efficiency, our team can still help you assess whether solar PV is a good fit for your home and help you find any available funding or financing.