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Independent Brooks is a ground-breaking approach to gaining significant savings in energy use and household energy-related expenditures. It will lead to improved comfort, indoor air quality and reduced health risks. The Project will result in the weatherization of all 410 homes in the rural community of Brooks, Maine. It moves beyond the individual household to create a model that addresses conservation at the regional scale. In partnership with private funders and energy companies, it creates an innovative financing mechanism to help financially challenged households. Independent Brooks will generate green collar jobs while, at the same time, dramatically raising economic and ecologic literacy throughout the community.
Purpose The purpose of this project is to accomplish residential weatherization at a rate radically higher than that achieved historically in Maine, resulting in a minimum of 25 percent energy savings across an entire community. Leveraging the expertise and commitment of the Newforest Institute, the Project creates a new hybrid entity that conducts energy conservation activities and coordinates each household’s participation.
The Project demonstrates a new, community-based model that not only accomplishes significant energy savings, but also puts dollars to back to work in the local economy that would otherwise be exported out of town, out of state and ultimately, out of country. This project is about growing the local economy based on established green collar jobs, and providing technical and financial support for the variety of ancillary vocations and services that result from a significantly higher level of energy efficiency. By training community members to shoulder the work of weatherization, within the larger context of community-wide education in building science, the Project will build on the Town’s well-established tradition of civic involvement in building projects. The Project extends tangible economic gains to non-traditional workers. The community model is positioned to overcome cultural and economic barriers to energy conservation in under-served rural communities that have proven to be difficult to address through existing programs.
Goals & Outcomes Physical
Audit and weatherize all 410 year-round buildings in town over 5 years Realize 25 percent energy reduction Produce 1,100 tons of verifiable carbon emission reductions Economic Train and certify local cadre of audit and weatherization technicians Create 20 green-collar, living-wage jobs over 5 years Reduce insurance costs/claims and fire emergency incidents Redirect $250,000 annual fuel expenditures into local and state economy Community Dramatically increase household economic literacy Mainstream energy education Reduce health risk factors across community via improvements in indoor air quality Overcome obstacles to universal energy conservation participation Creative
Create replicable model for other cities and towns Establish a rural counterpart to the Berkeley model for financing energy improvements Develop new technology tools to facilitate community energy initiatives Create a “virtual Brooks” based on the Mannahatta Project model Lay the groundwork for subsequent energy/cost reductions and academic research Why Newforest Institute?
Newforest Institute has been an active and effective agent of energy efficiency across several relevant program areas. Since the summer of 2008, it has conducted Energy Auditor training courses for Maine Housing, resulting in the certification of over 100 energy auditors throughout the state. It has developed house modeling software and protocols that have been used widely in the field and been taught at both Unity College and University of Maine at Orono. Not only does Newforest possess expertise in professional training, but it has also delivered building science education to related professional groups (e.g., Midcoast Board of Realtors, continuing education for P.E.s) and to the public (e.g., MOFGA, Unity’s Neighbor Warming Neighbor, and Grange talks). Newforest is uniquely positioned to advance energy efficiency and conservation at multiple levels of constituents.
Together with its partner the Midcoast Magnet, Newforest launched the Build Green Maine network of more than 600 building and energy professionals. In January 2009, Build Green Maine hosted the State’s seminal green building and energy efficiency event, the Built Energy Forum, for 270 industry practioners. This event brought state agencies, contractors and nonprofits together with national building science experts. Momentum from this event carried over into landmark energy efficiency legislation and the formation of an energy efficiency trade association in the summer of 2009. Since then, Build Green Maine has launched a forum that provides regular consultation of all those statewide organizations and agencies engaged in the building and energy efficiency trades.
Through its varied activities, Newforest has built a coalition of partners who are willing and eager to work with it on the Brooks Independence Project. To date, participants include: Maine Indoor Air Quality Council, Maine Preservation, Revision Energy, Bangor Savings, Thompson’s Oil & Propane, Coastal Enterprises, Women Work and Community, and the Waldo and Penquis CAPs. These partners are in addition to the array of local civic organizations in Brooks and the several building and energy organizations that participate in Build Green Maine’s regular stakeholder series.
In its short history, Newforest has achieved an impressive record of community engagement within the Town of Brooks. In May 2008, Newforest conducted a material waste study for the town, quantifying the components of waste stream and developing a plan for significant energy and cost savings, bringing together town officials, the Unity Area Regional Recycling Center personnel and executives of the Penobscot Energy Recovery Corporation which processes the Town’s MSW. This experience was subsequently leveraged to perform waste studies and programs for Mount View High and Morse Memorial Schools in MSAD 34. Newforest’s Dirt Bath project has engaged hundreds of students in environmental education and the planting of edible food forests on school grounds. It has been the driving force behind the establishment of a children’s forest on town land in Brooks. Beyond these specific projects, Newforest has played host to and partnered on numerous community events.
To date, Newforest has already established a detailed database of all buildings in Brooks. This not only allows the project to proceed with focus on high-value energy returns, but also permits varied reporting metrics (e.g., the town currently has 784,000 sq. ft. of enclosed, conditioned living space). This inventory built from tax records will be further developed during the Project with detailed audit data of every structure providing a first-of-its-kind community energy baseline. Already, Newforest has hosted multiple stakeholder and public meetings about the project and has received universal support. There currently is a waiting list of households eager to participate in the project.
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