Tools

Communities across the country are pursuing renewable and energy-efficient solutions to reach a more sustainable and resilient energy future. This toolkit can support communities in achieving building electrification, grid decarbonization, and transportation electrification.

If you are short on time, you can begin by exploring some of the key resources listed below. If you know where your community is in the clean energy planning process and have a project in mind, you can click on “Plan Now” to identify resources relevant to your stage of planning. For more guidance, education, and tools, explore the full resources database with over 250 resources on clean energy planning.

Key DOE Data Resources

SLOPE: The State and Local Planning for Energy platform is an easy-to-access online platform to support data-driven state and local energy and decarbonization planning.
LEAD: The Low-Income Energy Affordability Data Tool assists in program planning and creating better energy policy decisions by improving the understanding of low-income household characteristics.
DOE's EVI-Pro Lite provides a simple way to estimate how much electric vehicle charging you might need and how it affects your charging load profile.

Key Guides and Solution Centers

NREL's A Guide to Energy Master Planning of High-Performance Districts and Communities was developed to demonstrate how implementing district-scale high-performance strategies can be successful and scalable approaches to achieving deep energy savings that increase affordability, improve resilience, reduce emissions, and foster economic development. This document serves as a framework illustrating an iterative process of building support for, planning, and implementing high-performance districts by engaging stakeholders, setting aggressive energy goals, completing technical and financial planning, and implementing a high-performance energy master plan.
DOE's Better Buildings Solution Center has a wide range of resources that address efficiency, transportation, decarbonization, resilience, financing, community engagement, and workforce development.

Key Equity Resources

Greenlining Institute has many resources for equitable energy transitions. Start with their report, Equitable Building Electrification: A Framework for Powering Resilient Communities, which helps address barriers to building equitable decarbonization, or the Mobility Equity Framework, which supports equitable, community-centered transportation planning based on performance metrics.
USDN's Guidebook on Equitable Clean Energy Program Design for Local Governments and Partners introduces a process and principles that local governments and their partners can use to design equitable clean energy programs in their communities.

Key Funding Databases

Federal Funding Opportunities for Local Decarbonization (FFOLD) helps local governments prioritize and leverage existing federal funding to advance system-wide energy transition goals-from block grants and technical assistance to competitive grants and loans.