Four years ago Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) was set to roll-out to communities across the country and was a key element of our State and Federal strategy to stand up a energy efficiency industry and consumer value proposition. However, In July 2010, FHFA released a Statement on Certain Energy Retrofit Loan Programs, which essentially killed residential PACE by advising Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to avoid buying mortgages with PACE assessments, leading many PACE administrators to suspend their residential programs.

In the meantime, a number of pirate PACE programs stayed in business and proved that PACE can drive significant demand and volume.  In particular, the HERO program in Southern California has done over $100M in residential PACE loans, and just today released a preliminary rating for the first PACE Securitization.

Based on now proven success, and a continued belief by many that PACE is not the threat FHFA made it out to be, and that it is a critical component to meeting our energy and climate goals, many have continued to fight for residential PACE. In California that fight is about to bear fruit.

The California Alternative Energy and Advanced Transportation Financing Authority (CAEATFA), with the backing of the California Governor Brown, is about to roll-out a first of its kind PACE Loss Reserve Program. CAEATFA recently published a final version of its PACE Loss Reserve Program which should be officially approved based on their website, by the second week of March - only a few weeks away.

It would appear that we may have a second chance to make Residential PACE happen in California, and if we can make it work here, perhaps the rest of the country as well. A big thank you to all the people who continued fighting for PACE and to CAEATFA and Governor Brown for keeping PACE and residential energy efficiency a priority.

The last remaining question is really FHFA and how they will react to California's new plan. With their primary concern dealt with through the State reserve fund covering any potential losses, I hope this question will be put to rest so we can get on with the business of creating American jobs and saving the planet!

I recently came accross this video from a UC Berkeley panel from back in 2011 entitled Sustainable Residential Energy Use, Design, Feasibility, Performance.  Given the current state of residential energy efficiency in California and across the country, the points being made are perhaps even more relevant today, as many of the problems outlined can now be proven based on actual programmatic results. Residential energy efficiency is at a crossroads where we will either transition towards real markets, or become a footnote.  However, since 30% of California electrical energy is used by existing homes, we can't afford to keep failing. It is time to change the model away from our programmatic roots and towards market based solutions that trade in energy efficiency as a resource.

Watch the full program.