We all know that using less energy pays (don't we?) by cutting utility bills, reducing demand for fossil fuels and belching less carbon into Earth's climate. But the issue of how to pay for energy efficiency upgrades to your home or commercial property can be a hurdle too high to leap.

Enter PACE, Property Assessed Clean Energy, a financing process that ties the value of improvements - and lending to support them - to the value of your property, not to your personal credit capacity. Across Missouri, including the KDHX service area, the HERO program is connecting municipalities (they levy property taxes) to lenders to energy-smart contractors to property owners to build PACE into our energy usage.

John Maslowski, VP of Marketing and Development for HERO in Missouri, tells Earthworms host Jean Ponzi the what-why-how of PACE. The program's website includes a spiffy animation that explains it too. John and Jean go into what kinds of efficiency measures HERO can finance, connecting with contractors, and what's in this benefit package for local communities and property owners.

In the KDHX listening area, HERO is available in 7 St. Charles County and 14 St. Louis County communities, the City of Arnold in Jefferson County, and all of Franklin and Greene Counties; also in the Kansas City and Columbia areas. Check with your mayor or City Manager if your municipality is not on the HERO list; other PACE programs are at work here too, or PACE can come to your community.

PACE is a great deal. We hope this podcast energizes you!

Music: Lime House Blues, performed live at KDHX by the great Del McCoury, August 2013. 

THANKS to Josh Nothum, Earthworms engineer.

Related Earthworms Conversations: Energy Efficiency: Policy, Financing and Relationships that Power It All with Josh Campbell, Missouri Energy Initiative - September 2016.