Bolstered by state grants, Zero Homes is expanding its staffing to help electrify buildings
by Allen Best
If Colorado is to achieve its greenhouse gas reduction goals for 2050, it must replace natural gas furnaces in nearly a million houses and other buildings. Geo-exchange makes sense in new homes, but heat pumps are the easier answer for existing homes.
That is where Zero Homes fits in. The Denver-based company will — with nearly $1 million in state aid — expand operations in metropolitan Denver.” The company has 23 employees and says it will add 53 new jobs.
The company helps homeowners navigate home electrification. Among the services it provides, according to its website, are heat pumps, water heaters, induction cooking, EV chargers and electrical upgrades.
To assist homeowners in completing upgrades, Zero Homes has pioneered an “all-virtual” process that reduces the cost of implementing high impact upgrades. The process is completed through a free mobile app and backed by the Zero Homes team, which supports customers from project design to installation, including job scheduling, final inspections and rebates.
The approach seeks to simplify the entire process and reduce overhead for both homeowners and installers.
This announcement comes just after the Denver Regional Council of Governments formally launched Power Ahead Colorado to revamp buildings. That project across Denver and parts of eight other counties was funded by a nearly $200 million grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that was announced in July 2024. See: “A great transition 50 years from now,” July 27, 2024.
Zero Homes was founded in 2021 by Grant Gunnison. On his LinkedIn profile, he calls himself the “Founder & Night Janitor.” Before that, he had been an integration and test engineer at the NASA Ames Research Center in Boston and a graduate research assistant at the MIT Space Telecommunications, Astronomy and Radiation Laboratory in Cambridge.
“I care deeply about protecting our planet and equity in all forms. I help homeowners figure out how to make their homes healthier and emission free, without all the hassle,” Gunnison says in his LinkedIn profile.
Offices are located in Denver’s RiNo neighborhood.
Zero Homes also reports working with electrical cooperatives in Gunnison County, the San Luis Valley and El Paso County as part of a agreement with Tri-State Generation and Transmission.
The company has also been involved in a program to electrify 2,800 homes in California in the city of Los Altos Hills.
Clearly, heat pump technology is central to the company’s mission, as is evident in this post on its website.
In announcing the Zero Homes expansion, Gov. Jared Polis emphasized the job creation.
“In Colorado, we are committed to reducing our carbon footprint and saving Coloradans money on energy bills,” said Gov. Jared Polis in announcing the news. “I am excited to welcome Zero Homes to Colorado, helping us to boost our clean energy economy, and creating 53 new good-paying jobs.”
The jobs will pay an average annual wage of $140,377. Positions will include software engineers, operations staff and management. The company currently has 23 employees in Colorado.
“We’re proud to be building in Colorado and to be leading the charge to rebuild our communities and homes in a more sustainable way,” said Zero Homes’ Gunnison.
“This support from the state makes a strong statement about what the administration values and the innovation they are willing to back to enable the future we want. Heat pumps and more affordable, healthier homes are more accessible than ever.”
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I can’t help but believe that , somehow, Xcel will find a way to make extra money on this deal. They’ll say they need additional infrastructure, that all customers pay, or, literally any other excuse to raise rates they can dream up.
If Xcel has to raise your bill to meet the requirements of electrification, it’s not their fault. It’s the fault of the people making these stupid laws.
Zero Homes makes a few innovations in the residential heating electrification “process” (a nice word for what nearby homeowners experience, which is generally being talked out of electrification by HVAC and electrical contractors and the local building department).
Most importantly, through Zero Homes’ automated process, they produce design documents which an HVAC contractor can use and meet the myriad requirements of energy codes, utility incentives, mechanical and electrical codes. The already labor-short contractors hate all that. Also, the typical competitive “process” might present the homeowner with multiple bids, BUT not on very similar equipment.
I think Zero Homes’ may even manage drop shipping of equipment. (The installing contractor then pays them a cut, but makes out by significantly reducing his/her own OH & labor costs.)
I’m not clear what they do, if anything, about weatherization improvements which are often central to replacing gas combustion w/heat pumps.
Mechanical/energy codes require a “Manual J” heating/cooling load calc, which I’m sure their software provides. Utility and local programs may also require some HERS (Home Energy Rating Software) energy audit.
I THINK one of their local competitors (Elephant Energy) created software to do both from the same survey. (Both calculations require the home’s characteristics like wall, roof window sizes and types and HVAC types and conditions and air leakage are taken by someone. It’s a total waste of professional time that these are repeated for the separate calcs. )
So, very cool and useful approaches, but given my recent experience locally with escalating demand for inspections and approvals by building departments for simple solar, I’m dubious either company’s improved processes will be widely adopted.
Please prove me wrong Colorado. I don’t like being so negative.