
Li Ling, lead engineering consultant at VEIC, is awarded the RESNET Recognition of Women Pioneer in the HERS Industry award. (Courtesy photos)
Interview by Janis Petzel, MD
G.E.T.: Congratulations on your award. Please tell us about your work.
Li Ling Young: I’m a Lead Engineering Consultant with VEIC, the parent company of Efficiency Vermont. In that role I head up our work as RESNET Rating Provider, including technical trainings, quality assurance and direct energy rating services to our customers.
Efficiency Vermont is an efficiency utility. We provide efficiency services to everybody in Vermont, just like an electric utility provides electricity to their customers. Efficiency Vermont was the first efficiency utility in the country, and I’ve been with VEIC since the beginning of Efficiency Vermont.
I work in residential energy efficiency. Under the HERS system we provide free home design consulting and on-site evaluations to homeowners, builders, and architects. That’s what the HERS system does–gets builders the info they need at critical points in construction. Performance testing at the end of construction provides the feedback builders need to evolve their practices.
[Background: HERS stands for the Home Energy Rating System developed by RESNET, a not-for-profit membership corporation that was founded in 1995 to develop a national market for home energy rating systems, with a goal of moving residential energy use toward net zero. The organization created home energy rating scales, indexes, standards, training, and certification programs for home energy raters.]
G.E.T.: Please tell me about the award you received in March, 2024.
LLY: It’s the Recognition of Women Pioneers in the HERS Industry, 2024 Class of RESNET.
I’m proud that they recognized my long-term work. It’s a great pleasure to work with the young women coming into the industry. I’m particularly inspired by my women colleague engineers, data analysts, building scientists, who are experts on how buildings function–how to make a home healthy, comfortable, durable, efficient, and affordable.
G.E.T.: What impact has your work with Efficiency Vermont had in Vermont?
LLY: Vermont has high quality energy efficient homes. Compared to homes in other states, we really do stand out. Our homes are built with better air sealing, for example. We showed Vermont’s builders how to accomplish this by leveraging the HERS rating system, using incentives, setting standards and conducting performance testing, so people would know what a healthy, energy efficient home looks like. We train builders, contractors, and tradespeople like electricians or insulators, on energy efficiency techniques. We give them feedback. The energy rating method is a mechanism to encourage builders to do better. And it has all happened on a voluntary basis.
G.E.T.: How can you provide services for free in Vermont?
LLY: An efficiency utility is not completely free. Everybody in Vermont pays a tiny amount on their utility bills—but the savings on energy far outstrips the small contribution each household makes. The benefits are regional. Anything we do in Vermont flows to everybody in our region, decreasing power costs to all of New England through ISO New England.
G.E.T.: Do you have a favorite story about the impact of your work on people’s lives?
LLY: We worked with one family as they designed their new home. I ran into the owner 5 years later. It turns out that after they moved in, the woman needed major surgery. Just as she got discharged from the hospital, the area was hit by a power outage. They had horses to care for, so they could not move away. The woman said they just hunkered down through the outage. Because the house was so well sealed, it never really got cold inside, which allowed her to recover at home and be there to take care of the horses.
G.E.T.: What does your award mean to you?
LLY: It’s not about me, it’s about building on standards and tools created by other people to make the most of them in our state and to help people do better. In partnership with RESNET and EPA Energy Star for Homes Efficiency, Vermont has made Vermont homes better. We’re reaping the benefits of long-term partnerships between Vermont builders and Efficiency Vermont. Energy-experienced builders means that people are getting healthy, comfortable, energy efficient homes even if they don’t work directly with us.
Janis Petzel, MD is a physician, grandmother and climate activist whose writing focuses on resilience, climate, and health. She lives in Islesboro, Maine where she advocates and acts for a fossil-fuel free future. She serves on the Islesboro Energy Team and is a Climate Ambassador for Physicians for Social Responsibility.
Sources:
https://www.resnet.us/articles/2024-class-of-resnet-recognition-of-women-pioneers-in-the-hers-industry/
https://www.resnet.us/about/us/
https://www.iso-ne.com/about/what-we-do/three-roles
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