Portland Press Herald Letter to the Editor from Will Alexander, Brunswick.

Winter feels closer than it should. And as temperatures drop, heating bills are beginning their steady climb. Maine has some of the oldest buildings in the country, which means a lot of the heat that we are paying for is going straight out the walls.

Every year, Mainers send $5 billion out of the state to pay for our oil consumption. It is a drain on the whole Maine economy.

Home weatherization is one of the easiest fixes for this problem. It has relatively low upfront costs, and it begins paying for itself often within only two or three winters.

Still, many families simply can’t afford the upfront investment.

Luckily, Efficiency Maine has helped Maine families with loans and rebates for home weatherization. In doing so, it has produced about $400 million in economic benefits for Maine, and has saved enough electricity to power Maine homes for an entire year.

And yet, under the LePage administration’s leadership, the Legislature struck down crucial funding for Efficiency Maine. Their rationale: it would have raised electricity bills during a tough economic time.

That is true. It would have raised them by $1.13 per month. But this small increase is far outweighed by the resulting benefits. It isn’t just the people who get rebates and loans from Efficiency Maine who benefit, but all Mainers. The money that one homeowner saves gets spent somewhere else within the Maine economy.

I’m proud to say my own representative, Alex Cornell du Houx of Brunswick, is working to help Maine reduce its dependence on foreign oil. He and legislators like him are working hard for our economy, our environment and our security. We should follow their lead.

Or we could keep literally throwing money out our windows.

http://www.pressherald.com/opinion/letters/ferry-not-fireboat-can-serve-workers_2011-11-14.html