Founded in 2019, our mission is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Addison County in a timely and equitable manner, while promoting and supporting a just transition to a healthy and sustainable local economy.

About Us

Our Values

  • Cultivating a thriving, diverse, inclusive, and resilient economy comprised of many low-carbon enterprises and small businesses.

  • Serving as a Vermont leader in home and business participation in energy efficiency, energy transformation, and renewable energy generation opportunities, while ensuring these opportunities are available to all socio-economic sectors of the community.

  • Creating and supporting a transportation system that provides great, efficient and affordable mobility choices including walking, biking, transit, rail and ride-sharing. Maintaining a vibrant downtown and developing other high-density areas are essential to the success of this effort.

  • Engaging the young people of Addison County by putting their energy and creativity to work in tackling the climate challenge and also attracting younger residents and families to settle in the area. Mentorship, apprenticeship, and job training are key strategies to create multiple pathways towards community engagement and employment.

  • Preserving and utilizing the productive lands and natural areas in and around the community to provide ecological services, forest and food production and recreational opportunities. Forestry and agricultural practices should minimize environmental impacts and maximize carbon sequestration. Preserving, using and expanding our productive lands and natural areas to provide healthy agricultural practices, ecological services, forest and food production, and recreational opportunities. We support forestry and farming practices that minimize environmental impacts and maximize carbon sequestration.

  • Respecting the dignity of each individual in our community, and ensuring that good food, housing, and other necessities are affordable and that all individuals and families have what they need to thrive.

  • Investing in resilient, efficient, and ecologically sensitive infrastructure that can withstand an increase in extreme weather, facilitate energy efficiency and reduce environmental impacts.

  • Meeting  economic, environmental, and social health challenges through integrated solutions rather than through fragmented approaches that meet one of those goals at the expense of the others.

Our Story

The idea for CEAC started in the fall of 2017 when Middlebury was chosen to participate in the Vermont Council on Rural Development’s (VCRD) Climate Economy Model Communities Program. 

This project was a citizen-driven effort with VCRD, local leaders, and many interested community partners, to cultivate economic development, innovation, and affordability in the face of climate change. Over 150 participants attended a series of public meetings to identify strategies and develop action plans for strengthening the vitality and prosperity of Middlebury and surrounding Addison County Towns.  Task forces discussed prioritized topics of energy, transportation, agriculture and regional capacity for change.

In 2019, we officially incorporated. Since then, we’ve launched several initiatives to analyze and combat the causes of climate change on a local level.

What’s Next for CEAC?

  • The Energy Navigator Project, years in the making, is finally in its pilot stage. We have hired Shannon Bryant as director of the program, and we hope to recruit more paid and volunteer Navigators. All hands are on deck as we develop this program and get it up and running.

  • In 2024, we're updating our greenhouse gas inventory, yet again. When it's finished, the report will be posted here.

    • With public entities, such as municipalities, town energy committees, and the Addison County Regional Planning Commission

    • The Addison County Economic Development Corporation, the Addison County Chamber of Commerce, and other business organizations

    • State and federal government entities responsible for climate work and climate funding, capitalizing on the momentum generated by the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act and the climate funding approved in Vermont’s FY 2023 State budgets

    • Efficiency Vermont, Green Mountain Power, CVOEO, and other entities already engaged in climate and energy work in Addison County

    • Middlebury College and Community College of Vermont students, faculty, and administration, building on past successes with student interns, “Climate Fellows,” other college groups and resources

    • Vermont, New England, and National Climate Organizations such as VECAN, EAN, Electrify America, that are working on similar issues at the state, regional, and country level.

    • Organizations and individuals focused on climate justice issues, including those focused on BIPOC, low-income, and under-resourced populations, including NAACP of Rutland area; SURJ (Standing Up for Racial Justice); Migrant Justice; Addison Allies, New Frameworks (affordable housing) and others supporting migrant farmworkers; and HOPE (Helping Overcome Poverty’s Effects), Addison County’s foremost service organization for low-income people.