Given that people spend about 90 percent of their time inside buildings, it’s not surprising that the indoor environment can have a substantial impact on health.

While this isn’t an issue that people often consider, it poses real problems. Of all building stock in the United States, 53 percent is more than 35 years old – and some of that contains hazardous construction materials like asbestos and lead. In fact, around 4 million US homes are exposing children to dangerously high levels of lead.

In the United States today, nearly 28 percent of families live on incomes less than 200 percent of the federal poverty line. And although they may be the least able to bear it, low-income families face disproportionately higher energy burdens than wealthier households. They spend a far larger percentage of their total household income on paying utility bills than the average U.S. household. In fact, a recent report found that, for families living in large cities, the median low-income household’s energy burden was more than three times as high as that of non-low-income households. This provides the context for why improving the efficiency for low-income households is so important. 

The rise of LED lighting has meant major energy savings over the last 10 years, particularly in the residential sector. But savings opportunities for these residential utility lighting programs will soon be fading out because of growing LED market saturation, as well as potential federal standards coming into effect entering the next decade. 

In the United States, commercial buildings account for 20 percent of all energy use. With the right programs in place, you might imagine plenty of potential for energy savings in commercial real estate (CRE). And you’d be right. But utilities have struggled to serve this hard-to-reach market for a few reasons. It’s a complex, multifaceted network that contains many different building types, decision makers with conflicting incentives, rigid investment cycles, and divergent priorities. This presents a challenge to implement energy efficiency through the traditional utility channels.

When it comes to delivering valuable digital customer experiences, utilities are among the worst-performing industry groups, according to market analysts J.D. Power. We know customers love using smartphones and laptops for banking, shopping, managing travel plans, and more —yet for one-third of energy consumers, interacting with their provider’s digital channels feels like a trip back to the dark ages.