Going Green in 2019

Curious as to what benefit a homeowner receives when converting to environmentally friendly appliances? Take a listen to Jennifer Lucas chat with Julia-Maria Becker and Saeed Kaddoura of the Pembina Institute to learn about Going Green in 2019. 

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Intro 0:00

Welcome to In Your AREA, a podcast designed by AREA to update, educate, and refresh, realtors, brokers, and industry stakeholders on topics that matter most to you. Listen on the go, in your car, at a coffee shop, wherever your day takes you. This is a podcast designed with today's busy realtor in mind.

Jennifer 0:32

Welcome to in your area a podcast for Alberta realtors on the move, podcasting from the board room of the Alberta Real Estate Association. I'm your host, Jennifer Lucas for this episode going green in 2019 I'm an associate at Royal Lepage Neuralgia real estate in Fort Saskatchewan as well as a former trainer and advisor for Natural Resources Canada's and are good for houses and eco energy program. Joining me today are two experts from the Pembina Institute, Yulia Marie Becker and Saeed Kuduro. Yulia is the director of clean energy and Pembina and Saeed is an analyst on the clean energy team. Thank you for joining us to share your expertise. Can you tell me a little bit more about your experience in your roles and why you're joining us today?

Julia-Maria 1:18

Hi. Um, thanks Jennifer for introduction. So I work for the Pembina Institute. [inaudible] institute is a clean energy think tank. We were go to solutions to work towards a more sustainable energy future and with an no Berda we work on, um, within the clean economy team. We work on renewables and efficiency, cleantech carbon pricing. So we figured out what, uh, um, policies that need to happen in the province to move forward to more sustainable energy future. And we do that together with industry, with government, with provincial, municipal and um, government and community. So our organization, um, what is actually quite interesting, um, just to give a little bit of a background is an organization that started over 30 years ago in the Drayton Valley. So we have been living and breathing and working in Alberta and on issues related to energy in Alberta. And we are working, so say you and I work in the clinic economy team and we work especially around clean tech and renewables and energy efficiency and finding solutions together with the different stakeholders to move us to more sustainable. Um, and it's the future into province.

Saeed 2:43

Yeah, I mean I, uh, I play, I'm a supportive role as an analyst, a vigilias as a vision, a on the clean economy team. And, um, I like to identify as a policy geek. So I'm lucky to be able to get it to work with a lot of the kind of the groundwork around the modeling and the number is, but, uh, we, we really look at how we can, how we can encourage some of these, uh, uh, green policies in Alberta, not just from a, from an, from an environmental perspective, but a lot of these, uh, these kind of new ways of doing business are really, uh, are really economical. So, uh, it's not just about the environment, it's also about doing things or doing business. Right. So, um, I'm looking forward to talking to you about how these two things kind of overlap today.

Jennifer 3:26

So obviously energy is a huge topic in Alberta right now. You can't turn on the news without hearing something about energy. But a lot of realtors, realtors today and homeowners don't realize the impact that they can have living within their own home. I know when I was in an energy advisor, I was constantly telling people about the impact of improving the efficiency of their homes that if everybody did in an Alberta, it was like taking, I think the stats for something like a hundred thousand cars off the roads. And so I think as part of this, um, podcast, we really want to drill it down for them today because I think, um, realtors get a lot of information. Obviously we're in houses and sometimes homeowners aren't aware of the efficiencies in their houses. And so we can use this as a education piece for our realtors on how they can help both purchasers and buyers that are coming in and sort of set them on a roadmap to address some of the concerns that they might have, um, than some of the concerns that certainly come up during a transaction. So having said that, are you aware of any of the efficiency programs that currently exist in the province to help, um, clients in their homes and can you discuss what's available for them?

Julia-Maria 4:41

Yeah. Um, and it's quite interesting as you mentioned, it was a lot of potential for, um, individuals and homeowners to save money through energy efficiency, like investing in energy efficiency. But for the longest time there wasn't, it was only self-driven by people in Ibotta. So someone would be interested in this day, would have to figure out what is the best way to do that or ask for, um, an entity advice or, or it was very self motivated. So interestingly, I'm, Alberta was the last true chose diction and all northern America that started to have energy efficiency programs through energy efficiency. Alberta, I'm starting in 2017 so it's quite interesting to think that this hasn't been something that it's still very new to have programs that support people and give them guidance and give different, um, options for individuals and home owners to take advantage of energy efficiency. What I think is exciting, um, around energy efficiency unit, it's not only, um, helping homeowners to save energy at the end of the month or reducing their electricity bills, but it's also around making the house a small comfortable. So it is on an individual level. It's helping people to feel more comfortable in the houses, be um, less exposed to, um, changes in prices. Like natural gas prices are quite low right now, but we probably cannot expect them to stay dead low as we know from the past. So this is something on an individual level, it's, it's something interesting and exciting and so on an individual level helping people to save money but also then obviously contributing to the environment. Um, but on an systems level, it's quite exciting to think about the amount of, as you mentioned, the potential that we have to save energy is also when you think about in the past, whenever there was an increase in demand for electricity, what would happen would be that, oh, we have an increase in demand. So we have to build more, we have to build more generation, we have to build more infrastructure, we have to build more transmission lines. They have to build more distribution lines. So instead of looking into, oh, could we respond to this increase in demand through energy efficiency. So this is an opportunity that we haven't taken advantage in this province for the last decades. So when I was including energy efficiency into the energy conversation, as he said, makes so much sense to make sure that we invest our money in the best way and not just respond to an increase in demand through Oh, increasing demand, more generation needed. No, well perhaps you can invest in energy efficiency, which is almost always cheaper.

Jennifer 7:21

And what do you think the reason for this is? Why was Alberta one of the last provinces to get on board with these sorts of programs? Is it because comparatively speaking to other province, uh, comparatively speaking to others, our utilities don't cost as much. And so it's just not top of mind or are there just different priorities at a government level? Um, I s or c an increased right now with the efficiency programs. It's still not as great to some of the other provinces, but it is a start. Um, why do you think we were the last ones to get on board?

Julia-Maria 7:54

Yeah, I think that a few factors. Um, I think it's also, it might've been that it wasn't seen the need on an individual level, that there wasn't a lot of like political need described from people to ask for it. I think there's also something around normally how they are silenced and different jurisdictions is through something called a systems benefits charge. So that means that you put it on top of your it sorta utilities are the retailers have it on top of their electricity bill and perhaps they didn't want to get into that. I've been only living in this province so four years. So I um, there might be some internal, what is your experience on this vote

Jennifer 8:37

for me? Um, we're getting back to the way their original program was. So we're talking about reductions of Giga jewels. So that's very similar to the liberal and our guide for houses program when it first started. Um, and I think fundamentally Albertans want to be more green. You know, when we, when we're talking to homeowners, they understand the concepts about reducing greenhouse gas emissions. And I think everybody across the board understands that that's a priority. They just don't necessarily know how to do it. And, uh, so I also think it's, it's great that we have these sorts of programs. Um, I think the average consumer, I'm still understands a very simple program like equal energy for houses where, um, you know, you bro, you improve your furnace to a high efficiency furnace, you get $750. And I remember the first time I met you, Yulia in 2017 there was some discussion between area and the Pembina Institute about putting some education courses together. Um, and I think that's great so that realtors can talk in terms of efficiency and Giga jewels because I don't think that's language that we use everyday. I think it is starting with the younger generation. My children's certainly talk about it better than I do. Um, and I think that we really do, um, have an opportunity to educate. Um, you know, we're faced with us realtors, especially after a home inspection for example. Um, you know, the inspector coming out and starting to talk about levels of insulation or types of windows and, and, and so we can start to address those concerns either before, um, if we, if we can recognize those in houses or afterwards with our buyers, you know, once the inspection has happened. Um, and then we can, we can talk about, um, you know, that there are programs out there to help if it's a buyer for example. Um, but we can also talk about what we can do to improve comfort because quite often people will, um, you know, mentioned about drafts and you know, the houses drafty and we can talk about improving, um, the comfort levels and houses and really starting to think of the houses a system. Because I think, um, you know, it really starts with the builders, you know, new houses we've got, we've got new code on how things need to be built and then, and moving right along to the, the end consumer in a, in a, in a resale home for example.

Julia-Maria 11:06

No, and I, I think you brought up something really important. If um, homeowners don't even know the potential that they have at like the house has to create savings, stair and new opportunities that are out there, um, that they can take advantage of. Often. It's like, it's important that people know and I think I'm really as an important voice to provide that kind of inflammation. It helps future homeowners, all current homeowners and making their house is valuable and comfortable and energy efficient as possible. And what makes sense with India means and as you say, like in the right steps. And it's quite interesting. Um, so you can talk a little bit more about the different programs that are available. Now I'm through energy efficiency or better, but what I thought was interesting when they started, almost all the programs were over subscribed. So chose to hide like excitement that, um, is out there and the interest that is out there for these kinds of programs and for, to take advantage of energy efficiency opportunities when they are available. So it's, the program implementers have experience in different jurisdictions and they have that like the demanded it got here, the hunger for these kinds of products. And programs, they haven't seen something like that before. So it's quite a, it was quite interesting for me to hear that. Um, and I let say it, talk a little bit about the, um, energy efficiency programs that are at the moment. I'm currently available under energy efficiency, Alberta.

Saeed 12:32

Thanks Julia. So in 2018 we've seen some new programs come on mine and even some programs get expanded and modified. Uh, so on the residential side, we've got a program such as the rebate for residential retail products, which offers you rebates towards energy efficiency, energy efficient appliances and things that you can do on your home that would affect you on a daily basis. Uh, there were, we've also seen some, uh, some renewable programs come online. So on the residential side we saw the residential and commercial solar program that has incentives of up to a dollar per watt. And then we've also seen the announcements of the community energy capacity building programs. So this is on a more, um, community level. Uh, and what that does is it provides funding to build, uh, to build the capacity in communities by funding things like feasibility studies, business case development, some training to, to really bring this, the understanding of what the energy efficiency is and what the potentials are at the local community levels. Um, on the business side we've seen the business energy savings program, which offers the businesses are up to $25,000 to replace outdated equipment with energy efficient products. And we've also seen the nonprofits energy efficiency transition program, which allows nonprofits to do energy audits. It's something that we've took advantage of at Pembina ourselves actually in it's really helped us understand what our, what our energy use looks like and where some improvements can be.

Julia-Maria 14:04

Yeah. Just to Tribeca and it might be an interesting program to highlight with, um, like real tough that off not homeowners that don't go with homeowners, like with commercial buildings are like support on organizations that are looking for new. I'm also, so that might be something interesting to highlight with them. The other thing that I, um, that I think is really interesting for homeowners, sister whole mandatory plan that is relatively new. So that is something where entity from the Ibotta provides with the inflammation on, I'm getting how true best invest in energy efficiency and get rebates and you get, um, up to $1,000 of a bonus rebate when you complete three or more to your home and they support you in getting an evaluation and figuring out what makes sense in your house, what are the best and first, um, improvements that you should be doing. So that is definitely something that is worth looking into. And I'm highlighting with, um, future homeowners, but it is the energy efficiency. I'd go to a website and it's just efficiency. I birdeye dot. Ca That's the website and there are all the different programs and they did a really good job and making it accessible and figuring out an easy way on it's very user friendly. The website. So I had, for example, um, when I just recently bought an apartment and my, what if the person who reviews that everything is focusing. Yes. Thank you. Oh and spectrum. So it was very exciting for me to go to through the process and he was like, well, do you know there are rebates at the moment? You can get a nest thermostat and you get $75 rebate for if you buy that. And I was like, oh, thank you. Great. And like I was excited and he um, will sharing that information with me and like highlighting these kind of things.

Jennifer 16:03

You know, once the ECO energy program ended, uh, you know, I was, I was a little sad about that. Obviously I, I quit work and I had, I had spent a lot of time in it and then some of the new programs that came in, it took that piece out. So I'm really happy to see that with these new energy efficiency programs. We do have that third party going in there and talking to the homeowners about the correct order to do things in because, uh, you know, quite often I would come into a house and there would be the husband and the wife waiting for me and, and the wife thought for sure that they needed new windows. And so I would do a depressurization tasks and I'd walked him through and actually show them that, you know, maybe windows wasn't necessarily the first thing that needed to be done on the list and taking care of some air, sealing some insulation, um, and then perhaps a furnace and then the windows would be the correct or did you do it to really maximize their dollars? Uh, there are certain orders that things should be done in, in, you know, if you, if you buy a furnace before you put insulation on a, you can have an oversized furnace and that can cause you problems down down the road. So I was really happy to, to see that we've got, um, uh, some grant money available to help offset those costs and to bring in those qualified resources in, in the form of an energy advisor to help them walk them through and understand how their homeworks, um, yeah I was, I was certainly pleased for that for sure. But why do you think, this might be a question for [inaudible], why do you think homeowners want to, or should embark on these types of, those types of improvements? Is there any data or any, you know, from an analysis perspective, um, you know, say you, can you talk about, uh, what's the return on investment, um, on these improvements in energy efficiency?

Saeed 17:57

So when it's, when it comes to, when it comes to home owners, it really depends on two things. Part of it is a big part of it is your own consumption habits. Uh, that, so depending on what your, what's your energy bills, there are savings that are associated there. But then that's when the retrofits kind of come in. So the more ambitious that you are with, uh, with making sure that your energy use at your home or the way that your house is built or designed, implements a lot of these, these elements such as energy efficient appliances or making sure that, uh, you know, the leakage through your, your windows isn't there. It's, um, it's really all it, it depends on that and his is cumulative. Um, one thing that I can, I can maybe flip it around is, I mean, we often hear about the benefits to, to the homeowner. We can also think about benefits to businesses and, and kind of the bottom line. Um, we've seen stuff like, uh, improvements in even 10% of our businesses a energy use. So reducing energy use by 10% as a return of around 1%. Uh, it's equivalent to at 1% of sales. So when you think of a multimillion dollar business or even a million dollar business, those numbers do add up. Um, the statistics that I've seen explicitly around, uh, around homes. I've been recently looking at a, what we call a passive houses that are designed in a way that are 90% more efficient. Uh, so when you look at an average bill of a Canadian consumer around $200, when you say that becomes 90% efficient, you're essentially dropping that down to 20 bucks, which is a significant drop. And now when we look at passive houses, this is still a technology that's a, it's a, it's an ambition that we hope to reach an Alberta, but there are definitely steps that we can, that we can work towards that. And, um, also we can, you know, it's always easy to think of the benefits of the homeowner because we all have to live somewhere and we have bills to pay and it's the easiest narrative to disseminate. But it's also important to look at kind of what the benefit is to realtors and to other actors in the real estate community. As an example, I'm not sure if you know, but uh, their risks of mortgage default is less by around the third, uh, when it comes to energy efficient homes to compare it to regular homes. Uh, so and also not only do certify their energy efficient homes carry less risk, but there are also studies have shown that they're also worth more and they sell faster than a standard home. So the benefits extend beyond just the, uh, the average savings, the savings that are there are important and they're the easiest to access and they affect our daily lives the most. But I think it's also important to look at, uh, the, uh, essentially the whole sector and what does it comic growth within the real estate community look like and how does energy efficiency contribute to that? Just to add to that, I think it's

Julia-Maria 20:47

also something thinking about it kind of as a insurance for the future. So not exposing ourselves to price increases in the future, kind of protecting ourselves or as a homeowner, protecting ourselves against things that are not under our control. Like net, as I mentioned, like natural gas prices going up or other like prices going up. So by investing in energy efficiency, we kind of say like, okay, I take it into my hands and I'm going to make sure that whatever happens in the future, um, and make sure I'm also protected against it.

Jennifer 21:23

How about the carbon tax will help on the carbon tax? I know a lot of people are talking about that. That's a, um, certainly when it comes in terms of messaging, um, that is something that everybody understands. They understand that worm, that word. Maybe we could talk about a little bit about the messaging to improve energy efficiency and houses. Do you think that something like that would resonate with consumers?

Julia-Maria 21:46

These kinds of programs, um, are financed through the context of the energy efficiency. Ibotta is financed through the revenue from the carbon tax. All the money that comes, it gets reinvested into the economies. So investing it into clean technology, investing it into, um, renewables, investing it into energy efficiency. The idea is to broaden the economy and make sure that also in the future we have less exposure to international volatility of prices, but also by making sure there are different sectors getting strengthened. So broadening the economies, the intention to have the carbon tax, but also the original, like the basic idea is that by putting a cost on the pollution that we cause we give the market the um, power to be like responding to that. So energy efficiency, investing in energy efficiency is a perfect behavioral response to say like, okay, something gets more expensive, increasing my emissions or using, um, more energy gets more expensive. So I have to address that. And then the idea through having rebates. So, um, there's also the rebates that over 60% of our burdens receive is something that helps address that. But an energy, especially energy is a way to be like, okay, so addressing our consumption and including our consumption behavior and um, making sure that we can address our consumption, having support in it and investing in energy efficiency.

Jennifer 23:22

The pace program now it might not be called pace at the end of the day. And I've had some ministers tell me that they're not going to call it pace, but I'm wondering if you can describe to our listeners what that is and what your thoughts are on the implementation of that program. I know they're still working out the details, but so what should we be concerned with in this legislation, if anything at all? And I think you're that area, one of their focuses is on advocacy and Andy is an advocacy body. How should we be doing this? Or how should we be concerned? Or why should we be concerned about this legislation as it starts to roll out,

Saeed 23:58

feel like they always find the perfect acronyms for these stuff. So [inaudible] stands for the property assessed clean energy program. And essentially what it is is it's a mechanism to finance clean energy upgrades in your home. Uh, based allows investors or companies, whether they're public or private companies to fund homeowners to make energy efficiency and renewable energy upgrades. And that leads to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at the municipal level and savings for our homes and businesses. And it does this by allowing them to overcome to financial barriers. The first one is the lack of upfront capital. People don't usually have extra money blind around to invest in this kind of stuff. Uh, and the second, uh, the second barrier is the lack of transparency, transferability of this investment. So, uh, essentially what that means is that a differentiated space from a regular loan, and that's because the costs and the savings are attributed to a specific property as opposed to the person that's living on that property. So because the person that's occupying the property, it takes advantage of the savings. They are also responsible for the costs. So within that reasoning, if the property, this change ownership, then you owner then is responsible for the costs, but they're also going to be taking advantage of the associated savings. Uh, so by being able to overcome these two, these two barriers, that reduces the risk and, and kind of enables a lot more projects to happen. And this is a practice that dates back to 2009. And it started in California. It's been widely tested and implemented in over $4 billion have been invested through based programming and the u s um, and similarly the similar programs that are being explored all across Canada and Alberta specifically, we've got eight municipalities that have confirmed interest and over two dozen municipalities that are exploring this. So, uh, just like the other programs, I see this being very popular in Alberta.

Julia-Maria 25:46

That's what I think is interesting here with addressing the barriers that I'm, Sade mentioned if normally homeowners, especially here in North America, when you move a lot around, um, making investments into your house that don't have a payback, that is within the next two, three years is often seen as something like, oh, well who knows if I'm going to be living here in five years, so why would I make an investment like solar panels that take awhile to, for the payback to return to me. Right. Um, so by tying the investment to the building or to your property, you make it, then your increased the value of the property and you make an independent from the person. So it moves with the owner, not with the individual that addresses that barrier of longtime, longtime investment into houses by increasing the property value, looking in like exploring into what is the best way and how to implement it in Alberta. There are some, um, from our understanding there are still things to figure out on how to implement it another and what is the best way and making sure that what makes it successful in other jurisdictions. Um, the lessons learned from other jurisdictions are getting, um, consider it to you.

Jennifer 27:02

So is there still stakeholder consultation going on or, um, how far are we in this process, um, before it's getting rolled out? Or do you know this is something that area can still impact the policy decisions or do you think that's been done already?

Julia-Maria 27:17

Yes, there is a consultation opportunity from my understanding. I'm also energy efficiency. Alberta is working on debt, so that might also be a good way, um, to have conversations with them. I know that Edmund to the city of Edmonton is very interested in, um, figuring out a way that works to implement pace

Saeed 27:40

and they're looking at it as one of their kind of diversification strategies to go, uh, to go to where it's kind of greener alternatives. Uh, even so

Jennifer 27:48

the city of Edmonton has shown some leadership on energy efficiency and it began with a home labeling programs. So area, um, had some feelings on that and, and, and our membership had some feelings on energy labeling that it might not fit into a real estate transaction. So, so we have to be very careful about how we advocate to make sure that we're consulting with our members, making sure that this is a direction that we need to go. And so for me personally, it's my opinion that we have to start educating. I think that's important. And then come up with a mechanism and a framework that would work for home labeling within the framework of a transaction, uh, about it in the framework of a real estate transaction. But that's just my personal opinion. I'm certainly not speaking on behalf of area. Um, and there are certainly some areas, they're from our advocacy stance where we could probably still have some impact. And, um, I'm, I'm just wondering from you, where should we be focusing our attention?

Julia-Maria 28:51

Hm. And that might be something I understand the labeling. Um, there are concerns with your members. Might be interesting there another tool that in Edmonton, um, that might be interesting for um, your colleagues is the my heat map phytoplankton and the potential. And then people can look and offer and see like, oh, this is the sort of potential there to my, the building that you're buying or the property that you're buying Hess. And this might be something interesting to look into. And if you're interested in then you can like allude to the rebates that are designated a combination of things that um, uh, possible to offer that could be interesting on, on did on this while they are still developing this financing mechanism. The interesting, yeah.

Jennifer 29:38

Find about solar panels and, and some of the pushback I get is that we have snow seven months out of the year. But what people don't understand is that in Alberta we have some of the most consistent daylight hours. And so people equate I think solar energy with hot sun. And that's not necessarily the case. It's really the number of daylight hours that we have that we could really be capturing this renewable energy in our province. So that's it for my questions. Is there anything we missed?

Julia-Maria 30:06

I was wondering what was your motivation to um, get to certification? Um, and you mentioned you worked for the federal government, um, and yeah, Neff, Risa is Canada, so I was wondering what was the motivation and then also, um, how is that in your everyday life when you work with clients, how can you take advantage of the knowledge that you have and like, I mean from your questions obviously have a very deep understanding of these issues and the value of energy efficiency. And I was just wondering how that comes into play in your everyday life when you work with clients.

Jennifer 30:42

Well, it wasn't something that I searched out to be completely honest to my husband and I own a, a national home inspection company. And so our national head office was awarded a contract through natural resources Canada. They filled out the RFP and were awarded it because we were the only home inspection company with franchises in Quebec. So we could provide, um, and our guide for houses right across Canada. So essentially I woke up one morning and I got an email saying, guess what, you're going to do energy audits. So my husband and I kind of looked at one another and we drew straws and I'm the one that got to run with the energy side. And you know, I don't necessarily jump into things half assed. I tried to get as much knowledge as I can. So I did go and get the certification and I ended up building, um, you know, over the years, that side of our business, up to 10 advisors that worked for me. And then my background previous to home inspections was as a high school teacher and a French immersion high school teacher. So that got back to natural resources Canada and they approached me and asked me to come and take their train the trainers so that I could, um, train energy advisors across the country. So there were some really significant impacts for me because the differences in housing stock, um, on the east coast, which are, you know, centuries old are completely different to what is essentially relatively new housing stock here in Alberta. So, um, it was neat to have those conversations with Canadians right across the country, um, about reducing energy efficiency and, and the impacts they could have on, on various size sizes of housing stocks and ages of housing stocks. And I really did stick to the retrofit side. I didn't venture in, uh, not into a whole lot into the new build one, um, because I thought retrofit was a little more challenging and I, and I like to be challenged at work. Um, and to the idea of sitting in front of blue blueprints in a, in an office space didn't really appeal to me too much. I really, uh, enjoy going into people's houses and having those conversations and looking at a house that perhaps, you know, uh, was 200 years old and had, you know, uh, the horse hair in the walls and think how, how are we going to improve? What's the best way to improve the insulation in those walls to really seal things up and improve the comfort levels. So, you know, it was, it was really, um, quite a challenge in and was, it was new every day and I was in, you know, several people's houses everyday and having those conversations about, um, um, energy efficiency. And, and when I alluded earlier to the husband and the wife where they, they had preconceived ideas of what was the best bang for the buck and by the end of it, to be able to walk them through their houses as a system top to bottom and set up a roadmap for them. Because not everybody has, um, you know, a zillion dollars up front to make these retrofits. But were we were able to put them on a plan that said, if you do this first and then this and then this, here's potentially, you know, how efficient your home could be. And so, um, I really enjoyed those, those conversations. I was really pleased with how well received the, the, uh, Inter, uh, the equal energy program was. But still, I think the stats at the end of the day, we're maybe 20% of the housing stock in Alberta were actually assessed. So they're really still is, um, a lot of houses out there that could potentially be retrofitted. And, you know, as I said, consumers know when people know that they want to, you know, fundamentally reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. And so, you know, I think there's a really good opportunity for realtors to, to get educated and be that trusted resource for consumers. Um, so that when they go into houses with, you know, a potential buyer, they can point them in the right direction and they can be that, that source of information for them. And, and, and hopefully, you know, it's always good when you can, you can point a client, um, into something that's going to give them some money back. That's, that's something that, uh, you know, is good for the consumer. Thank you, Yulia and seed for your words of wisdom area members. We want to hear from you your feedback and suggestions for future podcast episodes will be critical to making sure that we make this the strongest resource for you. We invite you to send that feedback through communications@albertarealtor.ca. Thanks to all who took the time to listen. We hope to see you the next time we're in your area.