The military has been looking at ways to save money on energy costs for several years now. No doubt the current budget crisis is incentive to curb as much energy consumption as possible. Yesterday I read an interesting article about green military communities.
Unless you serve in the military, you have probably never heard of Lend Lease. A global, publicly-traded property development and management firm headquartered in Australia, Lend Lease is best known in the U.S. as a provider of military housing, on big Army and Navy bases including Fort Drum in upstate New York, Fort Hood in Texas and Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.Lend Lease and its military partners together are developing some of the "greenest" communities in the U.S., including two of the two largest solar-powered communities in the nation, at Island Palm Communities in Hawaii and Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tuscon; New York State's largest energy-efficient community development at Fort Drum Mountain Community Homes and Saddlestone Ranch, the largest LEED Silver-certified community in Texas at Fort Hood.
Davis Monthan Air Force Base where, incidentially, SpouseBUZZ LIVE will be on September 17th, claims they're leading the way in energy efficiency.
Davis-Monthan is leading the way in turning Air Force blue into green. As the future home of one of the largest solar-energy generating capacities in the Department of Defense, D-M is shaping a cleaner energy future here in the Sonoran Desert.
Lend Lease says it has measures in place to help consumers conserve and provides incentives to those who do.
Lend Lease also works with its tenants to show they how to conserve energy. (Remember, as the owner, the company generally pays the bills.) Military families at Fort Drum can earn reward points by cutting their consumption and if they go above a baseline number, they pay for the extra costs. "Some of our homes consumed three times the energy of others," Krista said. The firm offers free energy assessments, showing tenants where they can save. The company in July said it was committed to a 20 percent energy-reduction goal for its entire portfolio of military homes.
More news of plans Lend Lease has for military communities can be found here.
Any of you taken advantage of an energy audit (either on or off base) or "earned points" by cutting your consumption? What changes, if any, has your base or post implemented to conserve energy?
