ZeroDraft OKI is a Division of Drysdale & Associates, Inc, and specializes in residential and commercial energy efficiency. Home energy efficiency is a HOT topic what with energy costs soaring, and most homeowners are taken advantage of by window sales promotions, heating/cooling companies and most of all by our public utilities. Everyone promises to save you lots of money, but if you were to add up all the savings that each different faction claims, they would be paying you to use energy instead of you paying the utility company. ZeroDraft OKI takes a different approach. Our goal is to teach you how to reduce the cost of your energy AND at the same time, make you more comfortable in the process.
Since ZeroDraft OKI is based in Cincinnati, OH, and served by Duke Energy, we will focus on this region to illustrate the problem and begin to educate you so that you can make meaningful decisions towards greater comfort and lower cost.
In July of 2007, we learned that Duke Energy obtained a rate increase from PUCO (the Public Utilities of Ohio) to establish a program to help its customers reduce their energy costs. One component of the program is their Home Energy House Call. The following is from www.Duke-Energy.com:
What is [a Duke] Home Energy House Call?
The Home Energy House Call program is a free service that will provide you with personalized energy information unique to your home and energy practices.
How [Duke says] it works:
A trained energy specialist will visit your home, at your convenience, to conduct a thorough in-home analysis. The energy specialist will:
- Analyze your total home energy usage
- Check your home for air leaks
- Examine your insulation levels
- Review your appliances and heating/cooling system
Why is this relevant to ZeroDraft OKI?
The answer is that Duke Energy does not want you to actually reduce your energy consumption. Duke Energy’s main solution to conservation is “even billing” and doing things to make you uncomfortable - suggesting you keep the house warmer in the summer and colder in the winter. Duke Energy will tell you that thier HEHC program receives exceptionally high praise from their customers, an average of 4.8 of a possible high score of 5 from the people who request their Home Energy House Call. However, the majority of the customers who ask for help with their energy bills are not knowledgeable about how to reduce their energy bills. They view Duke Energy as their expert, and they give Duke excellent scores. Imagine your children taking science and physics in high school and the teacher’s performance review being based upon the scores that their students give them. As a parent you would be outraged. You would demand that your children receive a quality education as measured against quantitative performance assessments. Duke Energy has designed their HEHC specifically to teach down to their customers rather than to educate their customers because many of their customers (many of us, that is) want to feel good about doing nothing instead of developing our understanding of how we can genuinely make a difference and significantly reduce our energy usage.
The Duke Energy HEHC is a “feel good” program with minimal expected results. And in the words of one of the regional field managers for Duke, the analysis software they use is flawed. It is not designed to provide an individualized analysis of your energy usage, nor to provide competent advice regarding specific measures you can take to reduce your energy consumption. During the same conversation, the field manager explained to me how the utility (in years past) provided serious energy analysis to their customers. As more customers requested the service, the service was reduced to provide less and less meaningful information. Today’s Home Energy House Call is promoted as a FREE SERVICE. When the technician visited my home to perform the HEHC, he asked why I was having it done. I replied, “Because I’m paying for it” (see your July 2007 Duke Energy bill). The technician was unaware that the program was funded directly by the customers!
ZeroDraft OKI is on a mission. We want you to understand what the PUCO and Duke Energy are doing. We believe that PUCO and Duke Energy have a fiduciary responsibility to properly educate the public with respect to genuine energy management and that this responsibility is currently camouflaged in a program that is intended to minimize the claimed objectives - and maximize our utility bills and the utility’s profits.
ZeroDraft OKI offers the Home Energy Analysis that the US Department of Energy actually recommends. Our trained inspectors are CERTIFIED by the state of Ohio in residential energy analysis. ZeroDraft OKI actually analyzes your energy consumption and MEASURES the air leakage in your home. Air leakage (infiltration) is the #1 factor in wasted energy in homes (Ref US DOE). The Duke Energy technician checks your insulation level but the ZeroDraft certified inspector measures how well the insulation in your home is performing! You see, in order for the insulation in your home to actually insulate, it must be in still air. If there is infiltration, the insulation may be present but it is not insulating anything. The Duke Energy HEHC does not measure your infiltration or explain how insulation works or what you need to do to make it work properly.
ZeroDraft OKI DOES. The ZeroDraft OKI Home Energy Analysis includes a blower door test to measure the infiltration, plus an infrared examination to show you the locations of the leakage. But no, this is not about leaky windows and doors. Yes, you should weatherstrip, but the major air infiltration in your home is hidden beyond your eyesight. Our infrared cameras allow you to see the hidden holes in your home, holes leaking dollars from your pocket to Duke’s bottom line.
We will be posting a full copy of the actual Duke Energy HEHC report on my home, along with a copy of the ZeroDraft OKI Home Energy Analysis, so that you can see the difference for yourself.
The ZeroDraft Home Energy Analysis costs $695. for up to a 3,000 sq ft house and requires approximately 2-4 hours.
Call us at 513 831-9625 to schedule a genuine ZeroDraft OKI Home Energy Analysis to close the door on nome energy analysis and start feeling better in your own home.