By Kristy Wagner

Staff Writer

Heat can be hard to come by for Mainers in these economic times and for some people it can be even harder to hang onto once they have it.

Green Sneakers trekked through Kennebunk in October to spread the word about how to make homes more energy efficient.

Katie Poole, York County’s Green Sneakers representative, said the time has come to move forward from canvassing into guiding residents through the home weatherization process. 

Maine Partners for Cool Communities founded the Green Sneakers project in 2010 when 125 volunteers canvassed 14 communities in the state, none of which were in York County.

Maine Partners for Cool Communities is an organization that educates Maine’s communities on energy efficiency and other ways to reduce global warming.

“Outreach is my job,” Poole said. “I’m an AmeriCorps member through the Maine Conservation Corps and through them I work with Maine Partners for Cool Communities.”

Poole became the York County Green Sneakers representative in mid-January. She works out of the Sierra Club office in downtown Portland, but Green Sneakers of York County should be moving their offices to Sanford in the future, she said.

“Basically what Green Sneakers does is we’re trying to help Maine meet its carbon reduction goals through energy efficiency. So there are really great programs out there like the PACE (property assessed clean energy) program, but if you don’t know about it you can’t take advantage of it,” Poole said.

She said people who do not know how to weatherize their homes most likely will not initiate the process.

“So basically it’s (Green Sneaker’s) goal to get out there and get people involved in making the changes that need to happen and houses that go through the energy audits and weatherization save about 40 percent of what they were spending on energy,” Poole said.

Weatherization tactics to save energy and money could include installing insulation in the attic, floor and walls as well as installing window treatments that prevent heat loss and drafts. Homeowners can also switch their heating system from oil to natural gas or update an outdated heating system.

When Green Sneakers marched through Kennebunk in October, volunteers collected a list of Kennebunk residents interested in making energy enhancing renovations to their homes.

Poole said she is going through her lists and organizing energy consultations for the houses of interested residents. Green Sneakers also is working on planning energy parties at the homes of Mainers who have weatherized their houses to show interested people the result of the process.

“We have a list of people that are interested in having walk-throughs. We do free walk-throughs and help educate (residents) on small things they can do. We really encourage people to get the energy audit, though, because we are not auditors,” Poole said.

Energy audits can be obtained through Efficiency Maine’s residential program. Efficiency Maine is an environmental entity formed in 2002 with the purpose of reducing energy costs and helping the environment through various efforts such as providing home energy audits and PACE loans to finance weatherization renovations.

Dana Fischer, residential program manager at Efficiency Maine, said 108 towns throughout the state have passed a PACE ordinance. If a municipality passes an ordinance, residents are able to apply for a PACE loan through Efficiency Maine to finance energy saving renovations to their home.

“In 2009 Efficiency Maine applied for a federal grant to start the PACE program. It is a revolving loan with a fixed interest rate,” Poole said.

A revolving loan means that money paid back by borrowers is loaned back out to new borrowers. She said people apply for the loan and an auditor from Efficiency Maine goes to the house, evaluates the home in terms of energy efficiency and informs the homeowners how certain improvements will save them energy and money.

Fischer said PACE loans are not credit based and there are no penalties for paying funds back early, but there are a few eligibility requirements.

“There is no minimum credit score, but there are some criteria to ensure people can afford loans even without the expected savings they receive (from weatherizing their homes),” Fischer said.

He said there are two primary requirements potential borrowers must meet.

“One is they have to have at least as much equity as they hope to borrow. Second, they must have a 45 percent debt to income ratio. We look at household income and no more than 45 percent of it can be spent on debt payments,” Fischer said.

Poole said in order to get the loan applicants also are required to weatherize at least 25 percent of their home.

Fischer said Maine launched the PACE program in April 2011.

“We’ve been at it for about 9 months now in terms of issuing loans and we’ve closed on a little more than 127 loans and we’ve had about 650 applicants,” Fisher said. “It’s exciting and not just because of what its accomplished in the state but because we’re the only operating residential PACE loan program in the country. What we’re doing is really leading the way on residential weatherization financing.”

Fischer said municipalities originally received education on Efficiency Maine by energy auditors, Green Sneakers representatives and Efficiency Maine speakers who attended municipal meetings and public forums.

“Now that the program is more or less established and we’re really focused on providing loans to residents most  new towns coming on board and most towns expressing interest at this point are really driven by residents contacting local officials and indicating that they want to get a PACE loan and weatherize their homes,” Fischer said.

Poole and Green Sneakers work to keep people in towns such as Kennebunk informed about PACE, weatherization, energy savings and renewable energy sources. She said the project canvassed Kennebunk and Kennebunkport but she would like to round up some volunteers to canvass in Arundel in the near future.

Until then, Poole has her list and she’s checking it every day to contact someone new about taking the next steps in making their dream of an energy efficient home a reality with the help of Efficiency Maine and Maine Partners for Cool Communities.

If someone is not on the list or happened to be out of town the day Green Sneakers canvassed but has heard about its efforts to guide residents through the energy efficient weatherization process, they can e-mail greensneakersyc@gmail.com, call Poole at 761-5616 or visit the Green Sneakers Facebook and Twitter sites.

“(Green Sneakers) is really an on the ground grass roots initiative. If (residents) are interested that’s what we’re here for,” Poole said.

Staff Writer Kristy Wagner can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 233.