Many of the suggested activities and results are based on the actions of one cooperative in MO. They started their program in the 80s and currently have about 10% of their members (23k meters) use geothermal heating and cooling. These activities were used both prior to the Federal tax credits in 2008 and afterward, consistently delivering good results. The benefits to the cooperative include a reduction in peak demand, increased revenue from fossil fuel conversions, and a happier member base.
Suggested Activities:
- Field Day at a geothermal installation (residential or commercial)
- Hold an open house/field day at a residential or small commercial installation that incorporates geothermal as the heating and cooling system. Hold the event when the project is far enough along that the equipment is installed, but there are still open walls and ceilings so the participants can see the unit and piping.
- Consider reaching out to a geothermal manufacturer to get a deal for the equipment as an enticement for the contractor or homeowner to allow the event.
- The exposure will provide important information to all contractors that attend and to interested homeowners as well. It will also give positive advertising exposure to the host contractor.
- Interaction with the local or state Home Builders Association (HBA)
- Consider sponsoring a lunch or reception as part of an HBA event in exchange for an opportunity to present information about geothermal.
- This will introduce many builders to the benefits of geothermal.
- Use newsletters to promote geothermal success stories (Residential and Commercial)
- Solicit homeowners or small business owners who have installed geothermal and write a story about their project and how it has improved their utility bills and comfort levels.
- Depending on how the story is written, it can give exposure to the contractor that installed the unit and/or a positive experience other co-op members can read about.
- Use social media to run ads on the benefits of geothermal heating and cooling.
- Incorporate short ads on the benefits of geothermal in your advertising cycle.
- Depending on the ad content, they can target contractors and/or homeowners, or both at the same time.
- Mutually beneficial advertising agreements between contractor and electric cooperative
- Offer joint advertising between contractors and your cooperative to promote geothermal. You can run an ad and tag it as ‘sponsored by ABC Contracting’. This can be accomplished through free social media posts or paid advertising with cost sharing.
- This starts developing relationships between the cooperative and the contractors/developers and provides geothermal and contractor exposure to your members.
- Info meeting for contractors
- Hold contractor information meetings at your home office.
- Consider making it a lunch engagement and feed the attendees.
- These meetings are suitable for conveying co-op program information.
- Details on co-op incentive programs
- Expectations the cooperative has for participating contractors
- Information about other incentives, such as the Inflation Reduction Act
- Highlight the benefits of geothermal to interested contractors.
- Hold contractor information meetings at your home office.
