For Residents

Understanding Utility Bills

• ComEd Current Rates and Tariffs
• ComEd Understanding My Bill
• CUB’s Making Sense of Your Electric Bill
• CUB’s Making Sense of Your Gas Bill
• CUB’s How to Read Your Electric Meter
• CUB’s New Renter’s Guide: This guide educates new renters about their rights and responsibilities.
• CUB’s Understanding Your Budget-Billing Plan: This resource is for gas and electric utility customers who have elected to be billed under a budget-billing plan, which allows customers to even out their monthly bills.

Understanding Energy Use in Homes

• Use of Energy in Homes: End-use consumption data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).
• ComEd My Usage: ComEd helps customers analyze their usage based on actual consumption and home characteristics entered by the customer.

Energy Efficient Product Finder

• ENERGY STAR Product Finder: Product certification/rebate lookup and Excel-based toolkit to benchmark, track, train, and drive low/no-cost operational savings.
• ComEd Efficient Choice: A resource for shopping and comparing energy-efficient products.

Contractor Finder

• Peoples Gas weatherization contractors
• Nicor Gas participating contractor
• ComEd HHC network: This database includes Distributors, Geothermal Service Providers and Heat Pump Contractors.
• ComEd Service Provider Network: This database includes contractors, distributors, engineering and design firms who have been trained on the processes and procedures of the ComEd Energy Efficiency Program.
• Illinois Solar for All Approved Vendors

Starting a Retrofit Project

• Building Owner Playbook: This resource published by the Building Energy Hub can help building owners get started with their retrofit project.

Extreme Heat Resources

• Keep Cool Illinois: A one-stop site for information about cooling centers in Illinois, which are air-conditioned public spaces where community members can cool down during hot weather. Cooling centers are open to everyone.
• DIY ways to seal and insulate the home: a blog with advice on preparing the home to stay cool during heat waves by adding insulation and air sealing.

Solar 101

• How does solar work?: A step-by-step guide on solar by Enphase.
• Guide on Solar Rebates and Incentives: Overview of financial assistance for solar energy available in Illinois.
• Home Solar Guide: guide to residential solar by EnergySage, featuring a Solar Roof Calculator
• NREL PVWatts^® Calculator: Estimates the energy production of grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) energy systems throughout the world. It allows homeowners, small building owners, installers and manufacturers to easily develop estimates of the performance of potential PV installations.

For Municipalities and Community Organizations

Home Performance Certifications

• Pearl Certification: Pearl has established the national standard for rating home performance. The company measures all aspects of a home’s performance — safety, comfort, operational efficiency, resilience, and energy management — and provide homeowners with actionable insights on what’s most important to them, whether they’re buying, selling, or renovating.
• LEED for Residential Design and Construction: LEED-certified homes are designed to provide clean indoor air and ample natural light and to use safe building materials to ensure our comfort and good health. They help us reduce our energy and water consumption, thereby lowering utility bills each month, among other financial benefits. Using the strategies outlined in LEED, homeowners are having a net-positive impact on their communities.

Guidance for Program Implementation

• Residential Retrofits for Energy Equity R2E2 Playbook – Energy Efficiency: This resource is designed as a tool for program administrators at community-based organizations and government offices seeking to establish, improve, or expand building energy upgrade programs for low- and moderate-income housing in their communities.
• Weatherization and its Impact on Occupant Health Outcomes: This report highlights the common environmental hazards present in poor quality housing that cause disease or exacerbate pre-existing health conditions, and demonstrates how weatherization and energy efficiency interventions can effectively mitigate them.
• Whole House + Electrification Playbook: A guide developed by the Green & Healthy Homes Initiative for state and local level implementers of healthy housing and energy efficiency programs to learn how to integrate additional measures into their programs to maximize health, safety, and energy benefits for low-income residential households.
• Equity and Buildings: A Practical Framework for Local Government Decision Makers: this document is intended to provide practical guidance that will help local governments center equity within their policies and planning for the built environment.
• 2023 Illinois Residential Stretch Code: The 2023 Illinois Residential Stretch Energy Code, effective January 1, 2025, is based on the 2021 IECC with amendments. These amendments ensure that the site energy indexes in the Climate and Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA) are achieved.
• 2023 Illinois Commercial Stretch Code Guide: The 2023 Illinois Commercial Stretch Energy Code, effective January 1, 2025, is based on the 2024 IECC with amendments. These amendments ensure that the site energy indexes in the Climate and Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA) are achieved.
• Energy Benchmarking: Energy benchmarking means tracking a building’s annual energy and water use by using a standard metric to compare the building’s current performance against past performance, and to similar buildings both locally and nationwide. These comparisons help building owners, operators, and managers to identify and implement energy efficiency opportunities, increase occupancy rates and property values.