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(continued from pp. 126–127)

So Wesleyan’s system isn’t “the answer”—no one thing is the answer. But it provides an important clue: spurred on by the recent powerful storms, everyone is working on clean energy now. “There’s nothing new in this at all, nothing that’s unique to this, no special technology. It is as simple as simple gets,” Rubacha says of the university’s microgrid. “It’s not a panacea, it’s not perfect, but it’s a step in the right direction for now.”

He asks me about what I’ve seen so far on my yimby tour. “I’m interested to see what it’ll look like in 20 years,” he says. Energy “is going to be way more distributed. I think there’s going to be a power something on every corner, whether it’s PV [solar panels], or a little engine, or a little storage container, who knows what. It’s going to be great.”

Each time I visit Montpelier I’m struck by how diminutive Vermont’s state capital is, as if I were in an HOscale train layout, but one with locavore dining, organic cafés, brewpubs, and white-collar state and insurance workers in blue jeans and L.L. Bean checked shirts. Montpelier has a soothing rationality. This tiny state capital makes it seem as though no problem is too big.

With that attitude, Montpelier has taken on a gargantuan task: to be a “net zero” city by 2030. This, says Vermont’s Energy Action Network, is “a bold, audacious, collaborative effort to have Montpelier lead the way as the nation’s first state capital where all of our energy needs—electric, thermal, and transportation—are produced or offset by renewable energy sources.” But this isn’t a moon-shot crash program; it’s Montpelier-size. The net-zero campaign is run by a committee of volunteers. We do everything with volunteers in New England’s small towns and cities, from putting out fires to feeding the hungry, but getting an entire city to cover all of its energy demands seems impossible.

Tim Shea is chair of the 16-member energy advisory committee. In his day job he oversees facilities at National Life Group, which occupies the largest office building in Vermont (550,000 square feet). The company has converted to a biomass heat plant, saving $400,000 in fuel costs just in the first winter, and added four acres of solar panels to its existing array to provide 15 percent of its electricity. I talk to Shea and assistant city manager Jessie Baker in National Life’s cafeteria, which is far better than it sounds: a pleasant room with high ceilings and sweeping mountain views.

How will Montpelier get to net zero in just 14 years? By taking a thousand, thousand small steps. Each improvement is incremental, and each incremental step is made up of hundreds of smaller steps: meetings, studies, grants, private and public partnerships. You need “day-one savings” to woo the public, Shea says. “It’s hard to dismiss day-one savings.”

As the first steps, Montpelier has installed solar panels to provide 70 percent of municipal electricity at a 15 percent savings over the old utility rates; installed LED streetlights; “weatherized” 500 houses; and replaced a brace of aged oil burners with a centralized biomass boiler system for 21 government and private buildings, eliminating 137,000 gallons of oil annually, Baker notes. These efforts have won the city some national recognition. Montpelier