The Clean Energy Finance Corporation has announced a $250 million Community Housing program, in partnership with the federal government. The scheme, designed to ramp the construction of cutting-edge, energy efficient community housing, will help build up to 1,000 new dwellings across Australia. In addition to new builds, finance to retrofit existing buildings will also be provided to improve energy efficiency and reduce bills for tenants.

Along with the announcement, the CEFC released a market report, which states, “Evidence indicates that low-income households tend to live in buildings with poorer energy efficiency, leading to higher energy costs. Poor building energy efficiency and high energy costs can have significant financial and health effects on households in community housing.

“There are many energy efficiency improvements with payback periods of five years or less that can be incorporated into the building fabric during construction. New-build community housing should be designed to ambitious energy efficiency standards and the existing stock should be refurbished to improve energy efficiency.

“While energy efficiency improvements involve upfront costs, more energy efficient community housing would lower energy bills and increase thermal comfort, improving households’ financial, health and carbon emissions.”

CEFC Community Housing Sector Lead, Victoria Adams, said, “Over the next year, our goal is to help finance the construction of 1,000 new dwellings, built to an average seven-star rating under the Nationwide Housing Energy Rating Scheme (NatHERS). With this standard, energy use can be reduced by an estimated 25 per cent.”

image credit . Kaz Pierce