Program helps customers save on bills

TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (WTHI) - Camille Gutierrez keeps her house cool in the wintertime and still pays as much as $159 a month on her energy bill.

"If I could pump my heater a little bit more, that'd be great. Saving money is key," Gutierrez said.

She called her utility company at the right time.

"I called Duke Energy and they suggested Energizing Indiana," she said.

It's a statewide effort by the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission and utility companies, including Duke Energy to lower energy usage, increase energy efficiency, and lower your bill in your home or business.

"The bottom line with this is it's cheaper to pay people to reduce their energy usage than it is to build new generating plants or to build new pipelines to move gas around the country," Energizing Indiana Managing Director Bob Nuss said.

This project has been in the works for about a year and half now.

They expect to assess 55,000 homes just this year.

"The impact is huge, in the first year, 2012, we expect to save enough energy of over 100,000 homes," Nuss said.

They also expect to reduce electricity usage in businesses by about 25 percent.

Here's how it works:

There are six types of assessment programs: residential home energy assessments, residential lighting, income qualified complete assessment, commercial and industrial rebates for facility managers and building owners, school building assessment program, and a program to help students learn about energy efficiency.

After you sign up, an assessor comes to your home or business to conduct an audit and install a variety of instant savings measures for no cost.

It's an effort to help utility companies and their customers like Gutierrez, while saving everyone money.

"Anything that could help me that would be wonderful," Gutierrez said.

Assessments will begin January 2.

To sign up now, click on this link or call (888) 446-7750.