As Message for Scarborough Residents From Efficiency Maine:

We wanted to share with you some news. Last night Michael Stoddard, our executive director, presented a check to the Town of Scarborough’s Fire Department in the amount of $42,750 for the replacement and installation of three new and innovative heating boilers. This award will help the community save taxpayer money, reduce carbon emissions and help to improve workplace comfort and productivity. EM has made a number of awards in the past few months in the commercial and industrial arenas across the state that are saving businesses money by reducing their energy dependence on heating oil.

On the residential side, Efficiency Maine’s Home Energy Savings Program (HESP) is in full swing. We’re over 300 Whole House retrofits to date across the state, up to an average of 36 energy efficiency retrofits per week, or 50 times the rate of 2008-9 before the HESP program was in place.

In Scarborough alone there have been 10 homes that have been completed or are in progress. We are seeing an average heating energy savings of 33% per home across the program, with some homeowners experiencing savings of 40-50% or more. Contractors are hiring new staff and buying new trucks and equipment. Homeowners are beginning to save hundreds and thousands of dollars per year in heating energy costs. HESP is working to build new businesses, reduce our energy burden and make a meaningful and measurable contribution to our economic recovery through market transformation.

As you may already know, Efficiency Maine won a $30 million grant earlier this year from the US Department of Energy to establish a revolving loan fund to provide low interest loans to homeowners across the state to make energy efficiency improvements to their home. This wouldn’t have been possible if it were not for the leadership of the Maine State Legislature to pass LD 1717, An Act To Increase the Affordability of Clean Energy for Homeowners and Businesses. We’re happy to inform you that the Scarborough Town Council voted to pass their own PACE (Property Assessed Clean Energy) Ordinance (as required for program participation by LD 1717) with an unanimous vote last night. This marks the 13th municipality that’s adopted a PACE Ordinance to date, and we are anticipating another dozen or more communities to adopt their own PACE Ordinances per month through the end of the year. EM staff has aggressively reached out to municipalities to raise awareness about the emergence of the PACE program, including having already met individually or in small groups with officials from more than 75 communities. The program is on track to launch by the end of November. More information is available online at www.efficiencymaine.com/PACE.