Maines Ecology School Aspires to Receive Living Building Certification From the Living Future Institute

The Ecology School has announced that they plan to hold a ribbon-cutting ceremony for their new, River Bend Farm campus on Earth Day of this year after successfully raising $13.5 million of their $14.1 million goal, Seacoastonline reports.

The Maine school, which provides innovative environment educational programs to younger students, has made headlines for its pursuit to obtain one of the most ambitious building standards in the world, the Living Future Institute’s full Living Building Certification. If the school is successful, it will be the first project in Maine to accomplish this feat. (If you would like to learn more about this standard and how it compares to Passive House, I highly recommend reading Lloyd Alter’s piece in Treehugger here.)

Based in Saco, which is just south of Portland, the Ecology School’s facilities are expected to be some of the greenest centers for learning in North America. The new campus at River Bend Farm will include a 9,000-square-foot student residence, 7,000-square-foot dining area, and 718 solar panels. These panels are expected to generate 105% of the campus’ electricity needs, and the surplus energy will be sold back into the grid.

“The new Ecology School campus is unlike anything that Maine has seen,” said the school’s president and co-founder, Drew Dumsch. “It will be entirely self-sufficient and will provide a living and breathing example of what a sustainable future might look like.”

To learn more about the project, check out their site here or their project page on the Accelerator here.