Energy efficiency status of the community housing in Australia

Abstract

Community housing in Australia provides a range of rental options to low-to-moderate income tenants ranging from short-term crisis accommodation to long-term housing. Most community housing providers rely on rental income as their major source of recurrent funding and the rents are often set to a low percentage of the tenants’ income. Therefore, these not-for-profit organizations have to operate within very stringent budgets. Tenants in community housing may also have special needs. Their energy consumption are relatively high, as they spend long hours in their homes. They are therefore particularly vulnerable to increasing energy prices, and in need of the most assistance in reducing these living costs. This paper researches the status of energy use and the needs of the community housing to reduce the energy and water consumption. There appear to be ample opportunities for water and energy efficiency improvement in community housing, e.g. insulation, more energy efficient hot water systems, etc. However, the organizations lack of time, knowledge, fund and expertise to improve energy efficiency makes it hard and thus create a room for the Government to take initiates to reduce carbon from this sector.