General
Energy Burden Data (Section V of the Performance Data Form)
For the purposes of reporting LIHEAP Performance Measures, main heating fuel is defined by the household. Therefore, at the time of application, grantees will need to ask each household to identify their primary heating fuel type (i.e., Natural Gas, Electricity, Fuel Oil, Propane, or Other Fuels).
If the client is currently using an alternative source of heat (e.g. electric space heaters) because their main heating fuel has been disconnected or because their main heating equipment is inoperable, they should report their preferred main heating fuel (e.g., natural gas) even if they are not currently using that fuel.
However, if the client prefers to use an alternative sources of heat (e.g., they use their wood stove instead of their fuel oil furnace to save money), they should report their preferred main heating fuel (e.g. wood) even if they sometimes use another fuel (e.g. fuel oil).
To complete Section V of the Performance Measures Data Form, grantees are required to collect annual energy bill data from the top five electric vendors, top five natural gas vendors, top ten fuel oil vendors, top ten propane vendors, and top ten other vendors based on the numbers of LIHEAP assisted households within their state. If there are fewer than five utility companies (i.e. electric or gas) or fewer than ten delivered fuel companies (i.e., fuel oil/kerosene, propane, or wood/coal) that serve LIHEAP clients, the grantee only has to report for the companies serving LIHEAP clients. If there are no companies delivering a particular type of fuel to LIHEAP clients (e.g. fuel oil) the grantee does not have to include that fuel in their report.
Some grantees are facing significant challenges in getting agreements with vendors and setting up information exchange systems. Grantees that want to prioritize their work to ensure that the highest priority data is collected should review the Vendor Selection Supplement under the LIHEAP Performance Measures Data Collection Guide. Grantees may also want to refer to the multi-state vendor lists to identify vendors operating in other states, and to reach out to those grantees for advice in the vendor engagement process.
To complete Section V, Part A of the Performance Data Report Form, grantees will need to collect 12 consecutive months of energy bill data from household's main fuel and electric vendors.
Most utility vendors (e.g. electric and gas companies) issue monthly bills to clients. For those vendors, the grantees should request information on all twelve monthly bills. Some utility vendors issue bimonthly bills. Those six bills would still count as 12 consecutive months of energy bill data.
Many clients who use delivered fuels will get several bills each month during the winter, and only one bill for the entire summer. On the application form, the grantee should ask the client whether they use the same company all year, or if they use more than one company. For those clients who use one company all year round, the grantee should ask the delivered fuel vendor for all bills issued during the target twelve-month period.
There may be variation among grantee timeframes for collecting household energy bills. For example, many grantees find it optimal to collect bill data from vendors at the end of the program year (e.g., request made to vendors in October 2017 for customer bill data from October 2016 through September 2017). This is the least burden option for most grantees.
However, other grantees collect customer bill data from vendors at the time of LIHEAP intake-which may result in 12 months of billing data that falls across more than one program year. This real-time data may furnish the best information with which to determine the optimal targeting of LIHEAP benefits.
States may consider alternative timeframes for obtaining 12 months of billing history, as long as methods are consistent across households and are reported to OCS.
In Section V of the LIHEAP Performance Data Form, LIHEAP bill payment assisted households who do not have 12 months of energy cost data would be counted in Part A-but not in Parts B or C of the LIHEAP Performance Data Form.
In most cases, this means that households must be at the same residence in order to obtain energy bill data for LIHEAP Performance Measures. However, in some instances, households may retain the same vendor/account number although they move between residences. The grantee can, at their option, report data for these clients.
All households receiving bill payment assistance should be counted in Section V, Part A of the LIHEAP Performance Data Form. However, households must have available energy bill data for 12 months to be counted in Section V, Parts B and C of the LIHEAP Performance Data Form.
In some cases, households who change vendors during the previous year may not have 12 consecutive months of data, and therefore, would not be reported in Section V, Parts B and C of the form.
Client energy bill data includes all required customer payments, such as monthly service charge, usage charge, and taxes. In addition, to get the best estimate of the client's total energy burden, it is appropriate to include any late payment charges and reconnection fees charged by the vendor.
Deposits for service should not be included in the energy bill data since those funds still belong to the client.
Expenditures should exclude optional charges such as appliance repair contracts, equipment purchases, and other special services.
Whether the grantee reports clients' pre-reduction or post-reduction energy bill data depends on when and how the LIHEAP grant is applied to reduce clients' energy bills. For example:
- In New Jersey, a client applies for LIHEAP and receives a LIHEAP grant, and then the ratepayer funded assistance is applied to the remaining bill. For New Jersey, the state should report the gross charges on the client's account (i.e., the full retail bill).
- In California, the client applies directly for the ratepayer discount (CARE), and then the LIHEAP grant is used to pay the discounted bill. In California, the state should report the discounted charges on the client's account.
When looking at LIHEAP impact on energy burden, it is important to look at the whole residential energy bill for ALL clients, including cooling bills for households that are assisted with natural gas, propane, or fuel oil heating bills AND heating bills for clients that are assisted with cooling costs [i.e., all home energy costs for heating and cooling].
The more the grantee knows about client electric home energy use, the better the grantee can make sure that client electric energy needs are effectively addressed by the program. [Example: For a certain number of clients, portable electric heaters supply a large amount of client heat. That should be taken into account in benefit determination, as well as education and energy efficiency program targeting].
Appropriate waiver (release) language in the client application, as well as vendor agreements, will allow utilities to release electric cost and/or usage data for customers who do not receive a LIHEAP benefit. Examples can be found at the performance measurement website (Client Waiver Examples).
It is important to help utilities understand that with a better understanding of household energy bills--LIHEAP benefits, education, and energy efficiency programs can be better targeted to electric customers. Therefore, the value to the client and the vendor should outweigh the incremental burden of providing data for customers for whom the vendor did not receive a LIHEAP benefit.
All grantees are asked to report on both heating fuel and electric expenditures. This means that in heating states, grantees are also asked to report households' electric energy bills which captures cooling data. Conversely, cooling states are also asked to report on households' heating fuel energy bills, even if households' primary expense is electricity for cooling.
Additionally, grantees have the option of reporting cooling equipment types in optional Module III of the report.
Section V, Part C of the LIHEAP Performance Data Form only includes those households from Part B with the highest (top 25% of) energy burden.
To pull out the highest burden households, grantees will first need to identify the home energy burden of each household reported in Part B. Zero-income households should be coded as having 100% energy burden. These households can then be sorted, and those with the top 25% energy burden are included in Part C.
Instructions for calculating energy burden for households reported in Part B can be found here.
It is important to note that in the instructions, the top 25% refers to the households with the highest energy burden, not to the households in each main heating fuel group with the highest energy burden.