2023-05-08 11:48:00
Energiebox, an initiative to help people make their homes more sustainable in an accessible way, employs sixty energy coaches. Three-quarters of them come from benefits and they are mostly over 50s. That has advantages.
A lady clung to him and said, “You have to save me, it’s 11 degrees in here! My house needs to be insulated!”
Jan uit het Broek (60) talks regarding one of his home visits last winter. He is sitting in a room above a café in Utrecht’s city centre. Eight fellow energy coaches, including Andrea Fritschle (58), listen attentively. They are being trained today and are sharing their experiences.
Do they already know each other? “We are classmates,” says Fritschle, nudging Uit het Broek amicably. The two retrained as energy coaches last November and have been “school mates for life” ever since, she says.
Tips, draft strips and radiator foil
Uit het Broek and Fritschle now work 28 hours a week for Energiebox, a project commissioned by municipalities and housing associations, carried out by Stichting Trias Innervatie. Back in school, she did fine. “That’s nice,” says Fritschle, who also works next door in a day care center for people with a mild intellectual disability.
Both now visit residents in their own municipalities of Nieuwegein and Utrecht by appointment, to provide them with practical tips, draft strips and radiator foil during a free consultation of regarding an hour. Together with the resident, they look at where energy can still be saved in the home.
That is sometimes easier said than done, according to the group’s stories. One of the energy coaches visited a lady with four sons, who all shower for twenty minutes a day. “Those sons were looking at me angrily on the couch because I told them how expensive that is,” she says. Uit het Broek knows the problem. The audience discusses how best to respond.
Life experience and more peace
It is precisely people over 50 who are very suitable for work as an energy coach, says Bas Bunnik, director of Energiebox. “We notice that they are good at instilling confidence in people. And that is necessary when you come to people’s homes.”
Moreover, people over 50 often radiate a little more calmness, he says. And because many energy coaches were previously on benefits themselves, many of them know what it’s like to get by with little money. That can make it easier to have a conversation regarding the difficulty or inability to pay the energy bill, says Bunnik.
Energiebox finds many suitable candidates through municipalities and the UWV. “We are looking for motivated people with social skills. Those are actually our only requirements,” says the director.
Fifteen municipalities invest money in Energiebox, because it contributes to reducing CO2– emissions and energy poverty in the neighborhoods and partly address them. In the winter, the demand for saving advice was greater than in the summer, although the coaches also have tips on how to keep heat out as soon as the temperature rises.
Apply as an over-50s
You will not become rich as an energy coach, says Uit het Broek. Still, he is happy to be able to do this job. “I do something for people and the environment. And nine out of ten residents are very grateful to you,” he says. “That hand you get when you leave. Then you know someone is glad you came.”
Since he was laid off from his job in the TV world in 2016, it has been difficult for him to find work. “Companies just don’t hire people my age,” he says regarding the reason he ended up on welfare. Fritschle worked in an orthodontics practice, but decided to stop himself.
Through his new work, Uit het Broek is extra grateful for what he does have. Every day he sees the impotence that many people feel when he visits a house with single glazing and rotten window frames. Fritschle was also shocked by this. “They feel abandoned by the government and the housing corporation, who let them live in moldy houses.”
Large cost item for people who are less fortunate
It has made the two realize that the energy transition sounds good on paper, but in practice it requires much more manpower and budget. “True sustainability is now feasible for people with money who can afford a heat pump, good insulation and solar panels. But it remains a major expense for the less fortunate,” says Fritschle.
Whether the two energy coaches always want to continue doing this work? “At a certain point we have helped all households that ask for help,” says Uit het Broek. “And we don’t know whether municipalities will continue to invest in this,” says Fritschle.
Uit het Broek is probably thinking ahead: “Give our tips as early as primary education. Teach children what it costs to take a long shower and leave the light on.”
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