Home Energy Efficiency Workshops: How to stay warm and save on energy bills

Most householders are amazed to learn about the heat loss in their homes – windows and doors (25%), roofs (25%), walls (35%) and floors (15%) – requiring constant re-heating to keep warm.  Aiming to help locals stressed by rising energy prices, BREAZE Inc. and a group of local organisations – Ballarat Zero Emissions Alliance (BZEA) – have banded together to run workshops to help Ballarat residents stop the heat loss. Home Energy Efficiency workshops will be running for four Wednesdays by Zoom and for four Sundays face-to-face at local neighbourhood centres in Ballarat East, Wendouree and Sebastopol from 11 August to 4 September. Led by Dale Boucher an accredited Victorian Energy Scorecard Assessor, the workshops offer locals free professional advice – how to get a better deal from energy retailers, cheap DIY fixes to stop draughts, the ins and outs of insulation and how to prioritise those bigger purchases to get off gas. There will also be one Zoom workshop for Property Rental Managers – Wednesday 4 September 3:30-5pm –whose clients, both renters and landlords, likely have need for advice on such matters.

The workshops are part of a City Partnership Program grant to BREAZE Inc, a founding member of the Ballarat Zero Emissions Alliance (BZEA) which aims to help drive Ballarat’s community wide Net Zero Emissions 2030 Plan.

Workshop content will cover: how to read your electricity bill, easy DIY fixes to improve thermal efficiency; how to use a thermal imaging camera to detect draughts (these cameras are available for loan from Ballarat Central Library and the Ballarat Tool Library); everything you need to know about insulation and new energy efficient appliances, along with government subsidies and rebates.