Just a comment on utility companies giving away free equipment. Utility companies normally face growing population bases and growing demand for their product. That means that they must make plans, years in advance, to finance and construct additional capacity. (The exception is natural gas companies). There are times where it is cheaper to reduce demand by replacing homeowners' badly inefficient equipment like old refrigerators than to build another coal or far more expensive, natural gas, power plant in your area. So the idea that the cost gets passed on to you the taxpayer or you the utility customer is actually quite unlikely.
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