Chevy Partners with MaineHousing on Carbon Credit Weatherization Program

Will help to weatherize 5,500 homes in Maine

A Maine housing weatherization program will receive funding for energy-efficiency upgrades, the first investment from a $40 million multi-year commitment by Chevrolet to prevent 8 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from entering the air.

Chevrolet has signed a letter of intent to partner with Maine State Housing Authority to support a program that will weatherize 5,500 low-income homes to help address the changing climate through community-focused energy projects. Over the term of the partnership, MaineHousing and Chevy will help increase energy efficiency through a verifiable carbon reduction program. Chevy is soliciting investment proposals nationwide through its independent third-party investor, Bonneville Environmental Foundation.

Cathy Lee, managing director of Lee International, was instrumental in establishing the MaineHousing carbon project, acting as the organization's carbon expert from the outset of the program almost three years ago. Lee said "the project is the first of its kind and the support of Chevrolet could help other states to adopt a program modeled on Maine's work.

"MaineHousing is leading the nation with it's Carbon Quantification Project and at the same time it has broken new ground in the worldwide carbon markets, said Lee.

Lee worked closely with MaineHousing Director Dale McCormick, who initiated the project, Lucy Van Hook, project manager, and Steve Erario, carbon quantification project coordinator, and Climate Focus, a Netherlands-based carbon consulting firm.

"Together, we have developed the first validated methodology for emission reductions from energy efficiency, using a performance benchmark for additionality — which is technical talk that means we can, for the first time ever, turn energy efficiency carbon reduction measures from weatherization into cash assets using a credible, verifiable and workable approach."

Lee said the MaineHousing weatherization approach to reducing carbon emissions is exactly the type of new approach that was debated in Copenhagen and Cancun and is now being encouraged by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Learn more about the weatherization methodology here.