Ottawa, ON — Canada’s Greener Homes Grant initiative is getting a new phase focusing on energy and housing affordability. The next phase will focus mostly on making the program more accessible to households with low- to median incomes.
As such, “Owing to the success of the program to date, the government will stop accepting new applications within the next two weeks to prepare for the transition to the next phase of Greener Homes,” reports Jonathan Wilkinson, minister of energy and natural resources.
The Greener Homes Grant initiative was expected to run for seven years, the program ended early with no new applications being accepted as of March 2024. It was initially launched on Dec. 1, 2020, but was ending early due to the likelihood of hitting the original budget selling, which was set at $2.6 billion.
Canadians who have already applied for the grant will still be eligible. Currently, there are about 300,000 initial applications from households who are in the system, and who may have had an initial evaluation done, but who have not had any retrofits completed. “This means that there will be work for HVAC contractors related to this program well beyond March,” reports the Heating, Refrigeration, and Air Conditioning Institute of Canada (HRAI) in a press release.
The newly revised approach towards the Greener Homes Grant will continue to offer interest-free loans of up to $40,000 to Canadians at all income levels. “It also includes the Oil to Heat Pump Affordability (OHPA) program, which provides grants of up to $10,000 to low- to median-income oil-heated households across Canada who want to switch to a heat pump,” reports Natural Resources Canada.
“Under new OHPA enhancements announced in the fall of 2023, the federal government has increased these grants to $15,000 for Canadians living in co-delivery provinces that have stepped up with a minimum of $5,000. The federal government will also be providing a one-time payment of $250 to low- to median-income households in co-delivery jurisdictions when they are pre-approved to transition to a heat pump.”
According to the federal government, the Canada Greener Homes program offers grants of up to $5,000 to make energy-efficient upgrades and up to $600 to pay for an EnerGuide home energy evaluation, before and after retrofits.
Eligible home upgrades include replacing windows and doors, adding insulation, sealing air leaks, improving heating and cooling systems (e.g., heat pumps) and installing smart thermostats and solar panels.
Over 500,000 households have applied for a Green Homes grant, with over 165,000 grants approved. The highest number of applicants come from Ontario (around 227,500), Quebec (around 85,600), Alberta (around 70,600), British Columbia (around 55,400), and New Brunswick (around 20,800). In addition, around 50 per cent of Canadians who have participated in the program have installed a heat pump.
The federal government estimates that the program has supported over 75,000 jobs in the retrofit economy, ranging from jobs in construction, manufacturing, home energy auditing, sales, clean technology, and financial services.
“The higher-than-expected uptake of heat pumps under the Greener Homes Grant program and the relatively high cost of heat pumps (compared to other retrofits) has meant that the average grant payment size to Canadians under the Greener Homes Grant program (over $4,200) has been significantly higher than initially expected,” reports the federal government.
The program anticipates that by 2027 there will be close to 500,000 homes receiving energy efficiency upgrades. As of Jan. 22, there were over 524,708 grant applications received through the national portal and via the co-delivery partners located in Ontario, Quebec, and Nova Scotia.
According to one British Columbia homeowner who participated in the Canada Greener Homes Grant, his home went from $3,000 to about $1,000 a year to heat his house, including air conditioning in the summer (which he didn’t have access to prior). “It was cleaner, more efficient, less drafty and made the house more comfortable all around. I highly recommend to anyone who is thinking about it to make the switch to a heat pump and I am very grateful to the Federal and provincial governments for the grant, without which we probably would not have been able to make the change.”
Ontario only
The Home Energy Rebate Plus program (HER+) will be closing intake to new applications as of Feb. 5, 2024. Operated through Enbridge Gas, Ontario homeowners participating in the HER+ program who have completed a pre-retrofit energy assessment on or before Feb. 5, may proceed with their retrofits and will continue to be eligible for funding.
“The enormous popularity of the first phase of the Canada Greener Homes Grant illustrates Canadians’ desire for their homes to be affordable, comfortable, and sustainable,” shares Wilkinson. “As hundreds of thousands of Canadians continue to retrofit their homes with Government of Canada support, we are readying the next phase of the Canada Greener Homes Initiative to offer more accessible support to families across the country who need it most while continuing to take action on climate change.”