Achieve Renewable Energy, LLC - Salem, Massachusetts

william S.

We are very pleased with the geothermal heat pump system Achieve Renewable installed to replace our oil heating system in 2018. We live in a suburb north of Boston. Our house presented an number of issues because it is old (1937), needed a duct system, insulation upgrade and our very steep driveway presented a challenge for the drilling company. Achieve Renewable solved all of the problems. Achieve Renewable also assisted us with the menu of incentives, tax credits, and renewable energy credits which greatly mitigated the cost of this system. The system has been fully operating for just about one year now. We calculated that we saved on average about $300 a month on heating, cooling and hot water costs.

Robin G.

We are extremely satisfied with our Geothermal heating and cooling system installed by Achieve Renewable. Larry and his team were extremely professional and helpful while assessing our needs. We included plans for the Geothermal system when we did a major renovation to our house that was built in 1874. Achieve worked seamlessly with our general contractor and his sub-contractors to integrate a heating and air conditioning system that keeps a perfect temperature in our 145 year old house. Even after 8 years, the system has met our needs and reduced our carbon footprint substantially! Through subzero temperatures and heatwaves, our house maintains a constant 73 degree temperature. This system has paid for itself and saved us a substantial amount of heating costs.

I highly recommend Achieve Renewable for any renewable energy projects.

Mike N.

Achieve Renewable Energy created a financial disaster for us and wasted countless hours of my time addressing their sloppy work. Their $60,000+ contract we signed in the first half of 2018 via the towns of Concord, Carlisle, and Lincoln's HeatSmart program promised their geothermal heating and cooling system would dramatically decrease our home's heating and cooling costs. But in addition to our discovering that the system has instead increased our heating costs, we have also had to endure:
• My messages ignored for days or weeks at a time.
• Achieve Renewable Energy leaving a dangerous open trench across our driveway for a week despite their previously stating in writing they must not leave the trench open.
• My discovering that their electrical work failed inspection several months ago and they never corrected it or informed me of that.
• Achieve Renewable Energy billing us several times for money we did not owe them despite my repeatedly correcting them.
• Their leaving our system with far less return air ductwork than supply air ductwork. (And they never obtained the sheet metal permit required by MA law for that duct work.)

When I informed Achieve Renewable Energy's director Larry Lessard that his geothermal system was using way too much electricity to heat our home his excuse was that our house was drafty. (The same house he himself examined before writing the proposal and contract for our project!)

The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center paid Achieve Renewable Energy a grant of over $14,000 to install this supposedly highly efficient geothermal system in our home. Yet Achieve Renewable Energy's design and installation was so poor that the system hasn't met the Clean Energy Center's published minimum requirements for system performance!

After our town's Building Commissioner inspected Achieve Renewable Energy's botched work at our home in March 2019, he promptly sent them a cease and desist order by certified mail. And it wasn't just a cease and desist order applying to work at our home. He was so concerned by their work that he applied the cease and desist order to the entire town!

We face tens of thousands of dollars in costs to pay true professionals to fix this incompetent geothermal system installation, ductwork, and electrical work. Achieve Renewable Energy will have to compensate us for it.

Clark W.

Achieve has nearly completed installing a geothermal HVAC & domestic hot water system in my 1970s era raised ranch in Framingham. The system is already operational; just waiting on the baffles to separate the zones. I have been consistently impressed by the high level of expertise and professionalism exhibited by everyone on their team, as well as the drilling, electric and ducting sub-contractors they have brought in. Their process involves a full home energy audit and Manual-J analysis to determine the home's heating needs. The level of detail in their proposal document was very impressive! Most importantly, they have been great about making sure I understood and felt comfortable with all the decisions throughout the process. In the end I have a HVAC system that I am confident will keep my family comfortable through the worst of the winter and summer while using surprisingly little electricity. Very glad I went with Achieve!

Brian G.

How does one pick a geothermal contractor when most of us are not geothermal experts? For us, it came down to trusting who we thought would deliver the most comprehensive design to match our house--at a competitive price.

Six months after our geothermal project installation (and a year after taking the first steps to get quotes), we’re still very pleased with Achieve’s whole-house, data-driven approach to geothermal system design and implementation:
1. Other firms we sought proposals from provided single stage estimates based on a 45 minute walk through of the house. Achieve’s two-stage proposal provided us with a much higher level of confidence that our dollars would be efficiently spent on a system designed for our house. Stage 1 featured an energy audit of our house rather than a general assumption of system needs based on house size. Stage 2 used the audit to provide a very accurate estimate of project costs and incentives based on the audit.
2. We also valued Achieve’s whole-house approach that integrated benefits of insulation and duct system improvements (identified from Stage 1 energy audit) to reduce system energy demand, size, well depth and cost while improving our comfort.
3. While the drilling, prep-work and installation of a geothermal system is disruptive—the Achieve install team, Gap Mountain drilling teams and other sub-contractors were courteous, hard-working, battled through snow/ice, taught us about each step and kept us appraised of schedule shifts.

Although this process required more time start to finish than other firms projected from planning to installation, Achieve’s approach gave us much more confidence that our investment would secure a right-sized system. We also benefited from Achieve’s participation in the MA pilot MVP contractor program, which provided additional, data-driven incentives for energy performance improvement. At the end of the day, our out of pocket project cost with Achieve was $10K less than other firms and included considerably higher value equipment, insulation, enhanced duct work and energy analytics.

Since our Dec 2019 install, Larry and Louise have been extremely responsive to our detailed-questions as we fine tune the system with their remote adjustments.

Steven L.

We have had our system for nearly 4 years and could not be happier with Larry and Achieve Renewable. They are a great company, stand by their product, and are happy to help and answer any issues that may arise. The system performed better than expected and we would hire Larry and his team in a second.