2025 LEAP Projects

Here’s a sample of LEAP’s 2025 activities: 

  • On Saturday, April 5 we were scheduled to hold the 17th LEAP Energy Fair at Crossett Brook Middle School. This fair is the largest such gathering in Vermont. Attendees at this free event tour displays and speak with experts about solar power, heat pumps, weatherization, green building, electric vehicles, pellet stoves, biomass, and many other topics. They also enjoy the free electronics recycling. Unfortunately, a few days before the event CBMS flooded and we had to cancel the Fair.

  • On Thursday, March 20 Alayna Howard and Kit Walker from LEAP gave presentations about ‘Saving Energy and Helping the Planet’ to students at the Brookside Primary School. They talked about various steps people can take to make a positive difference.

  • Throughout the year LEAP distributed information online and through interviews on WDEV on green energy topics such as weatherization, electric lawn tools, and electric vehicles.

  • LEAP is supporting an effort to explore the possibility of establishing a community path connecting Waterbury and Waterbury Center.

  • Each year Waterbury in Motion (a LEAP program) helps organize two Walk & Bike to School Days with Brookside Primary School and Crossett Brook Middle School.  At each event, around 200 children and adults gather at Rusty Parker Park. LEAP provides a free breakfast — bagels, fruit, OJ, coffee, muffins, cider.  After breakfast, the children and their chaperones bike, walk, or scooter to their respective schools. This year’s events took place on June 4 and September 24.

  • LEAP has been assisting the Planning Commission to write the Energy Section of the Waterbury Town Plan.

  • On Tuesday, August 5 we hosted yet another LEAP Electric Vehicle Fest. Dozens of local folks toured 19 electric vehicles and EV hybrids and talked with local owners about their vehicles. They also saw electric lawn equipment. Dave Roberts from Drive Electric Vermont spoke to attendees about the new EVs that have come on the market recently, the advantages of owning an EV, and the various tax credits and incentives currently available to Vermonters. To learn more about electric lawn equipment, visit mowelectric.org. Drive Electric Vermont has an excellent fact sheet listing all the EVs and plug-in hybrid EVs currently available in Vermont, with their price, range, tax credits, lease prices, and listing which are available in all-wheel drive. Learn more at driveelectricvt.com

  • LEAP helped the town of Waterbury apply for a Better Connections Grant worth $97,500 from the Vermont Department of Transportation (VTrans). Waterbury was the only Vermont town to receive the grant. It has been used to hire transportation consultants Stantec to create a community-based visioning plan for the core village area of Waterbury Center that explores opportunities for multi-modal connectivity, traffic calming, access management, and other steps to help local residents, employees, and visitors move between and among the various attractions safely and easily, while strengthening environmental, economic and community vitality in this area.  LEAP has helped coordinate the grant including focus groups, workshops, walking tours, and an online grant. The consultants will provide their final recommendations in summer, 2026.

  • On Wednesday, August 22 LEAP gave a presentation to students from the Project Harmony program on green energy topics and LEAP’s work to inform and inspire residents and organizations in central Vermont to undertake green energy projects.

  • For the second year, LEAP participated in the Window Dressers Program in which LEAP and other community members built low-cost window inserts so neighbors could be warmer this winter and reduce their energy use. Recipients of insulated window inserts pay a modest fee and can also volunteer to further reduce costs. LEAP partnered with other local town energy committees and together built and delivered 250 inserts for 43 homes. More than eighty volunteers built the inserts from November 13 to 19 at the Waitsfield United Church of Christ.

  • On Friday, November 14 LEAP held a free Button Up Weatherization & Home Heating Workshop at the Steele Room in the Municipal Complex. Attendees who joined this free event learned how to tighten up their homes to save fuel and money. A senior energy consultant from Efficiency Vermont spoke about: the most common ways homes lose energy; DIY steps you can take to tighten up your house; energy audits and how they work; energy-efficient heating systems such as heat pumps; loans and incentives to help get the work done; and rebates for those affected by recent flooding. To learn more about ways to tighten up your home and save energy visit efficiencyvermont.com