It has been incredibly quick, but the Georgetown University Energy Prize (GUEP) is now at the halfway mark, leaving just one year left for the City of Cambridge government and residents to reduce its total energy use through the Win It Campaign. In the past year, we have accomplished many projects and initiatives designed to help us win the GUEP!
– Block Captains: The City of Cambridge organized 3 community leaders and 11 volunteers to help citizens sign up for free home energy assessments to reduce total home energy use. Block Captains will continue to work throughout the year to inform citizens on reducing their energy bills for free. As the Block Captains will be an ongoing campaign, you can sign up to be part of this amazing initiative here!
– CPS Outreach: Cambridge Energy Alliance (CEA) partnered with the Cambridge Public School system (CPS) and the Department of Public Works to create activities around energy savings in school. In addition to implementing energy-saving actions such as turning off classroom lights and equipment, schools are provided free classroom and seminar instruction on energy efficiency through nonprofits ACE and “e”-inc. Email the Cambridge Energy Alliance if you are interested in hosting such an event at your school!
– Glocal Challenge: For the past four years, the Cambridge Community Development Department, Rindge and Latin High School in conjunction with EF Education First have organized the Glocal Challenge. Glocal (a combination of the words “Global” and “Local”) challenges Cambridge high school students to tackle global and local challenges with solutions that can be implemented at the local scale. The city worked with Glocal on the GUEP campaign, resulting in multiple winning projects that created energy efficiency kits for low-income housing units in partnership with organization Nest.
– Municipal Improvement Plan: The City of Cambridge committed to spending $5 million per year for 5 years to upgrade its facilities to improve their energy performance.
– Community Brainstorm: The City of Cambridge has routinely developed meetings to engage with local community leaders, educational institutions, businesses, and NGOs to brainstorm on further ways to enhance the Win It Campaign. In the late spring and early summer 2015, the city met with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Microsoft, Industrial Economics, Inc., and the Venture Café Sustainability Collaborative to discuss barriers to energy efficiency implementation. At the start of 2016, CEA developed the Steering Committee, a group of organizations that routinely meet to discuss the next steps for the Win It Campaign.
In addition to all of these activities, Cambridge will continue to provide outreach to citizens to make them aware of the progress of the Campaign. Currently, there is a sign posting throughout Cambridge that will update citizens on how many home energy assessments we’ve achieved. Check our Facebook and Twitter accounts for constant updates, and visit the Win It website to learn more and sign up for a free home energy assessment! We’ve got plenty still left to do!
Keep on the lookout for more posts this week as we continue to cover our GUEP progress!