Electricity for low-income homes

Published 27 August 2017

Sustainability Trust and ERANZ partner to deliver better access to electricity for low-income homes

Sustainability Trust and the Electricity Retailers’ Association of New Zealand (ERANZ) are partnering to deliver Access to Electricity — a project to help low-income households have better access to warm, dry homes.

“Access to Electricity aligns with the aims of Sustainability Trust. Our focus is on practical solutions for people to have warm, dry homes — and a safe, reliable and affordable supply of electricity”, says Phil Squire, CE, Sustainability Trust.

“We're proud of our Healthy Homes manager Miranda Struthers, who will be seconded to ERANZ to project manage Access to Electricity, starting end September 2018. Miranda has excellent experience in helping people have warmer, drier homes from her time at the Trust”, says Squire.

“This work was started because the ability to have a warm, dry home is disproportionately harder for low-income households. We wanted to see if there was more we could do to work with partners to deliver better outcomes”, says Jenny Cameron, Chief Executive of ERANZ.

“Many factors influence the ability to have a warm, dry home, such as the quality of the home, the efficiency of heaters and other appliances, lack of understanding about electricity use, level of income, as well as the cost of electricity.

“We believe partnering with Sustainability Trust to deliver Access to Electricity will make a real difference in addressing those factors to help those most in need,” Cameron says.

For more information, see here.