This collection
is approved with the following terms of clearance: this is approved
as an emergency clearance to meet American Reinvestment Recovery
Act requirements. DOE has agreed to coordinate programmatic and
evaluation collections across its WAP Evaluation, OWIP, and
Recovery Act offices in an effort to minimize cumulative burden on
respondents who might bear the burden of multiple DOE information
collections. For example, such coordination may result in a plan by
which DOE administers survey instruments and programmatic reporting
requirements in a staggered fashion. This collection will be valid
for six months. If DOE decides to continue use of the collection
past the approved emergency request clearance time period, it must
resubmit to OMB under the normal PRA clearance process for a
three-year approval. Upon resubmission, DOE has offered to provide
further detail on survey methods, experiments, and literature
support. For collections involving incentives, if available, this
further detail will include examples of similar types of
studies.
Inventory as of this Action
Requested
Previously Approved
10/31/2010
6 Months From Approved
1,950
0
0
69,136
0
0
0
0
0
This collection of information is
necessary for a comprehensive and rigorous evaluation of the
Department of Energys Weatherization Assistance Program, which
funds the weatherization of approximately 100,000 homes each year.
The evaluation will examine program operations, energy savings,
non-energy impacts, and customer satisfaction. Respondents include
states, local weatherization agencies, utilities, and occupants of
low-income homes.
As a pre-amble to this
supporting statement, the U.S. Department of Energy and Oak Ridge
National Laboratory (ORNL) are requesting emergency review of this
supporting statement and attached data collection instruments and
surveys related to evaluating the U.S. Department of Energys
Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP). The purpose of this
Program is to weatherize low-income homes throughout the United
States. In normal program years, WAP receives approximately $250
million in annual appropriations and supports the weatherization of
approximately 100,000 homes. The American Recovery and Reinvestment
Act (ARRA) contains $5 billion dollars for this program. The
expectation is that with this enhanced funding the Program will
weatherize one million homes per ARRA year and spur job creation.
The second issue is that delays in initiating the data collections
described in this document threaten the ability to create the
national energy savings baseline and the conduct of the special
studies. With respect to the first point, the evaluation plan calls
for ORNL and its independent subcontractor to collect billing
histories from utility companies for WAP program years 2007 and
2008. Substantial delays in data collection will threaten the
ability to collect 2007 data from the utilities because the
utilities routinely discard the data after a couple of years.
Losing access to 2007 data from the utilities will severely impair
the ability to create the national energy savings baseline needed
to assess WAP ARRA years performance. With respect to the second
point, the evaluation plan contains special studies to estimate
energy savings in weatherized homes that heat with fuel oil and
propane, and weatherized mobile and multi-family homes. Data for
these special studies will be related to WAP ARRA program year 2009
weatherization activity. Procedures to collect the required data
for these special studies need to be in place well before the
winter of 2009/2010 so that appropriate pre- and post
weatherization data can be collected.
On behalf of this Federal agency, I certify that
the collection of information encompassed by this request complies
with 5 CFR 1320.9 and the related provisions of 5 CFR
1320.8(b)(3).
The following is a summary of the topics, regarding
the proposed collection of information, that the certification
covers:
(i) Why the information is being collected;
(ii) Use of information;
(iii) Burden estimate;
(iv) Nature of response (voluntary, required for a
benefit, or mandatory);
(v) Nature and extent of confidentiality; and
(vi) Need to display currently valid OMB control
number;
If you are unable to certify compliance with any of
these provisions, identify the item by leaving the box unchecked
and explain the reason in the Supporting Statement.