Artwork by Ed Nolde, Sierra Club Maine Volunteer
June 2026
In this issue:
- Could Now Be the Time to Get Into an EV?
- Vote in the Maine Primary Elections on June 9th
- Community Conversations: Virtual Power Plants
- "No!" to Immunity for Big Oil
- Sierra Club Maine Sierra Sessions Recap
- Canoe the Allagash River Waterway with Registered Maine Guide Tomas Dundzila
- Plastic Free July
- 50th Anniversary of Bigelow Preserve
- Pine Tree Amendment Revival
- Green Tip of the Month
- The Month Ahead
- Volunteer With Sierra Club Maine
Could Now Be the Time to Get Into an EV?
By David von Seggern
I drive an all-electric Chevrolet Bolt and am crowing about the savings I have during this period of high gas prices. My top reason for going electric in 2023 was to be “green”, but the operational costs are now most welcome. At the time of this writing (May 14, 2026), the average price of gas in Maine was reported by AAA as a staggering $4.53 per gallon of regular. This is, of course, largely due to the oil supply problem caused by the events in the Middle East. Using the method outlined in my guide to calculate gas cost savings, the above price was entered, along with the other variables, to determine that my annual fuel cost savings would be about $800 if the gas price stays high. I drive a relatively small number of miles per year and I have a relatively small vehicle, and so those driving the average miles of vehicle owners in the US and having larger vehicles could save as much as $2000 per year.
The fuel cost savings is not the entire story though. Electric vehicles have a much simpler drive mechanism, have no pollution control, and need no exhaust system; and so service costs on gasoline vehicles will be greater over the years compared to electric vehicles. The long-term record is still being developed for EVs, but consider reading AAA’s maintenance guide for EVs to understand what is involved in maintaining an electric vehicle.
Efficiency Maine Trust wants you to get into an electric vehicle. Check out their rebates on the purchase price of an electric vehicle for one thing (applies to Low-and Moderate-Income individuals). And, if you are able to install a home charger at your residence, they will provide a incentive that can make that charger nearly costless.
Lastly, look at the time-of-use (TOU) rate that Central Maine Power (CMP) offers. If you charge your electric vehicle during off-peak hours, the cost per kWh goes down significantly. I have been on TOU rate now for several months and have seen definite savings. This effectively lowers the cost of fuel. CMP has a nice calculator that you can use online to find out exactly whether you will save with the TOU rate compared to the default rate — it is available when you sign into your CMP account on the web.
A new chapter of the Electric Vehicle Association has been just started in Maine. They will be helping you with EV information and advice through their webpages soon.
If you are in the market for a new vehicle, or even used, consider an electric vehicle. Once you drive electric, you can forget about volatile gas prices and maintenance of a myriad of moving parts. You can also forget about stopping at or waiting in line at the gas station. Now you can just wave as you drive past.
Vote in the Maine Primary Elections on June 9th
By Matt Cannon
Every election matters, but this primary will shape who wins in November, and the stakes are too high to sit this one out. Our democracy, environment, and climate are under threat. We need to elect people who can resist and protect our rights. With semi-open primaries, you can participate now more than ever. In particular, the gubernatorial election is a crowded field, so make your voice heard today, using Maine's ranked choice voting. If you want to find out more about how the Maine Chapter engages in political work and endorsements, please visit our website.
Absentee voting has started, and is a convenient alternative to in-person voting on Election Day. You can request your absentee ballot in-person, online, by phone, and by mail. Make the request today to allow enough time!
When you have your ballot, follow the instructions, and don't forget to sign the outside of the envelope! You can return your ballot in-person at convenient absentee ballot dropboxes, usually located at your town hall. If you return your ballot by mail, make sure it has time to get to your town clerk. We recommend returning your absentee ballot in-person (to your town clerk's office or a convenient dropbox) to avoid any USPS mailing delays.
Absentee ballots are due by 8:00 PM on Election Day, June 9. (the latest you can request is Thursday before Election Day, but don't wait!).
Remember, Maine's law allows you to rank your choices in the primary, so use it! The Secretary of State's office has a helpful overview of ranked-choice voting, information on your polling place, registering, or anything else about this Election, please visit the Secretary of State's website.
Community Conversations: Virtual Power Plants
By David von Seggern
Some of our members have undoubtedly heard of the Victory Gardens during World War II times. Would installing a home battery serve to gain victory in the energy transition? The answer is emphatically yes, and we’ve invited panelists Josh Castonguay, Ethan Tremblay, and Shannon Anderson to join us at 12pm on June 16 to explain why.
Briefly, home batteries have two purposes: home electrical backup and grid services. The former, met mostly by fossil-fuel generators at this time, is a common addition to residences. The latter is relatively new, but utilities across the US are beginning to design and implement programs around the addition of home batteries as micro-sources of electricity to the grid. These are called virtual power plants (VPPs), one of the hottest topics in electricity supply these days. In this case, the owner of the batteries can actually make money by arbitraging the energy stored in the home battery — buy low (off-peak times) and sell high (on-peak times). The utility, or its appointed broker, tracks the home battery input and output and compensates the battery owner for their contribution to the supply of electricity at times of peak demand. Large, commercial battery facilities are already doing this — why not individual utility customers with relatively small battery installations? It only takes intelligent software to get everyone into the game. At this time, peak demand in Maine comes during the week from about 5 PM to 9 PM, but that is changing as we move into using more heat pumps for heating (or cooling) and into charging electric vehicles at home.
Please join our community conversation on June 16 at Noon when a panel of experts will explain exactly what VPPs are, how they will help to control the cost of electricity during peak demand periods, and how Maine is beginning to implement a VPP through Efficiency Maine Trust.
"No!" to Immunity for Big Oil
By Matt Cannon
Most of us share the same basic belief: if you cause harm, you answer for it. That's how courts work. That's how communities heal. That's just accountability.
The oil & gas industry has spent decades knowingly doing harm, all the while its profits soared, and your utility bills, food costs, and insurance premiums climbed higher and higher.
Now, Big Oil and Gas want to buy itself Congressional immunity from ever being held responsible.
With Republican lawmakers explicitly working with the American Petroleum Institute and Big Oil's lobbyists, they have introduced the “H.R.8330 and S.4340: Stop Climate Shakedowns Act of 2026." Despite its name, this bill isn't stopping shakedowns. It's running one: gutting every existing state law holding polluters accountable, dismissing pending lawsuits on the day it passes, and handing oil and gas companies lifetime immunity.
But more is possible because we have fought for it! States like Vermont and New York have already passed climate superfund laws that make polluters pay into funds that help communities recover and rebuild. We just passed a critical Climate Superfund study in Maine, and plan to pass a follow up bill next year! Courts across the country are hearing cases brought by cities and counties to recover real damages from real harm. This is accountability working, and Big Oil and Gas want it gone before it goes further.
Sierra Club Maine Sierra Sessions Recap
By Sierra Club Maine
This year, the Maine Chapter hosted their first ever viewing party of the Sierra Sessions thanks to a generous grant from our national team. Members and supporters from around the state gathered to enjoy good food, company, and music centered on activism and our shared love for the planet. Difficult times can drain our communities if joy, hope, and connection, so it is more important than ever to gather with intention, and remember to celebrate our victories and shared values. If you missed us this time, don't worry! You can watch the recorded concert here, or support the national program and ensure Sierra Session Celebrations are accessible for years to come.
Canoe the Allagash River Waterway with Registered Maine Guide Tomas Dundzila!
By Corrine Kucirka-Adamowicz
This is a great opportunity to join a Sierra Club National Outing on our beautiful Allagash River Wilderness Waterway with Registered Maine Guide and Sierra Club Maine Chapter member Tomas Dundzila. Beginning on June 28th, you will paddle in the homeland of the Wabanaki, the People of the Dawn, who have lived here for thousands of generations in what is known today as the Allagash Wilderness Waterway. This epic paddling journey follows much of a 100-mile-long chain of lakes and rivers, and one of the few eastern rivers that can be paddled a week or longer without coming into contact with modern civilization.
Indigenous people paddled these waters for thousands of years. European settlers arrived and logged the surrounding forests. Eventually the Allagash was designated a National Wild and Scenic River in 1970. The Allagash has it all -- from tranquil lakes (less tranquil when the wind kicks up in the afternoon), to easy flowing flat water river sections, to some quick water and class II whitewater paddling (with options to portage these sections). The Allagash is more than a wildlife park. It is wild - a prime moose feeding area with otter, mink, muskrat, beaver, loons, ducks, geese, bald eagles and other birds of prey as well.
“Primeval, untamed, and forever untamable nature” is how Henry David Thoreau described the Maine woods after his explorations in 1846. Today much is unchanged. The vast forests, rivers, and lakes are not so different then when Henry David Thoreau journeyed here in the 1800s, to canoe its waterways.
We will paddle the Allagash roughly 80 miles north accompanied by a registered Maine Guide and Sierra Club Maine Chapter member, Tomas Dundzila, who offers a wealth of history, lore, and knowledge of the river. This outing is geared toward paddlers who enjoy backcountry camping. Our campsites have fireplaces, picnic tables and privies. We will take turns with cooking and clean-up. You will set up your tent, and have additional camp duties, but also have time to relax, explore the surroundings, read, take photographs, or identify plants. Each day we will talk about conservation in Maine and your local area.
Canoe rentals and shuttle are included in the trip price. Please use the below link to see the full itinerary, cost, and to sign up.
Plastic Free July
By Corrine Kucirka-Adamowicz
We’re hearing more and more about how plastic pollution affects oceans, rivers, wildlife, and ecosystems around the world, while disposable plastic products often end up in landfills and break into microplastics that persist in the environment and harm nature and humans.
Rebecca Prince-Ruiz and a small team in the local government in Western Australia started Plastic Free July in 2011 to combat the overuse of plastic in our everyday lives as a way to tackle this world-wide problem. They saw an opportunity to help people take practical steps to reduce plastic waste.
What started as a local initiative has grown into a global movement. Hundreds of millions of people across more than 190 countries have participated, making it an influential effort to address the growing problem of plastic pollution. This July it’s your chance to participate if you haven’t already taken the challenge!
Sign up here to take the challenge and receive tips and tricks each week in July to keep you motivated.
Want to do more? Take the Pesky Plastics Quiz Tool, to help you discover all the plastics that ‘sneak’ into your shopping and measure your Plastic Free July success. Share what you do now, and complete another survey in August to measure your successes!
Learn about more about the Plastic Free Foundation and Plastic Free July here.
50th Anniversary of the Bigelow Preserve
By Lance Tapley
Longtime members of Friends of Bigelow are organizing a public celebration marking the 50th anniversary of passage by Maine voters on June 8, 1976 of the referendum that directed the state to establish the 36,000-acre Bigelow Preserve.
The vote blocked a plan by Boston-area developers to transform the 12-mile-long Bigelow Mountain Range and surrounding forest into what they called “the Aspen of the East,” featuring a major ski resort and private jetport. Friends of Bigelow led the “people’s initiative” campaign against the development.
As a result, the people of Maine protected one of the state’s most important high-elevation mountain ranges, where the Appalachian Trail (AT) provides renowned hiking and camping and where there's a broad range of animal and plant species that prefer older forests.
The celebration will take place Saturday, June 6, at the Carrabassett Valley Public Library meeting room. A roundtable discussion on the “Save Bigelow” campaign’s significance for current environmental issues is scheduled for 3 to 4:30 p.m. Refreshments will precede an inexpensive catered-pizza (or bring-your-own) supper from 5 to 7 p.m.
Friends of Bigelow are also planning hikes of several distances in the Bigelow Range on Sunday, June 7, and Monday, June 8. The public is invited to join the hikes, some of which will include portions of the bare-topped range with its rare alpine vegetation, a scenic highlight of the 2,200-mile-long AT.
The grassroots group, with assistance from the early Natural Resources Council of Maine (NRCM), now the state’s leading environmental group, won the vote despite opposition from the developer, Independent Governor James Longley, and the Economic Resources Council of Maine, which had been established to oppose the NRCM's environmentalism.
“It may come as a surprise that Friends of Bigelow is still around,” said Lance Tapley of Augusta, who directed the campaign that saw hundreds of volunteers gather tens of thousands of signatures to put the Preserve question on the ballot and then campaign for its passage.
Friends of Bigelow members, Tapley said, have continued to monitor the state’s management of the Preserve, which is expected to be among the topics discussed during the roundtable.
His research, he said, suggests the Bigelow campaign may be the only instance in American history in which voters directly created a major park through a statewide referendum.
“And what group provided the strongest component of the victorious ‘Yes’ vote?” Tapley asked. “Maine’s working people. For example, we won easily in the working-class wards of Lewiston and Biddeford.”
Organizers hope the anniversary event will encourage discussion about how to generate grassroots environmental activism as well as renew public interest in the history and future of the Preserve.
“We could try to activate the many people who appreciate that the mountain range was preserved but after 50 years don’t know how it was done,” Tapley said. “And, of course, a lot more public interest in Bigelow could be specifically useful in protecting the Preserve in the future.”
For more information, including where and when to meet for the hikes on June 7 and 8, contact Lance Tapley, Augusta, Maine, 207-859-0044, lance.tapley@gmail.com.
Pine Tree Amendment Revival
By Green Amendments for the Generations
Eager for Maine to Secure Constitutional Recognition of the Right of All People to a Clean, Safe & Healthy Environment, Including Climate?
Join us for the Maine Green Amendment ~ Pine Tree Amendment Reboot Webinar
When: Thursday, June 11 at 12 PM Noon
Where: On Zoom
Sign up here
You'll hear from Maine Representative Laurie Osher, leading Maine advocate Andy Burt, and national Green Amendments for The Generations Founder Maya K. van Rossum to talk about the values of having enforceable environmental rights in the Maine state constitution.
In addition, we will preview new language, answer questions you might have, and invite you to join a strategic leadership team to meet and frame out the education and outreach campaign to come. In order to secure constitutional environmental rights, we need Mainers from across the state to be educated and engaged.
If you are interested please join, and help spread the word by sharing with others.
Green Tip of the Month
Do you have a green tip that you would like to have included in a future newsletter? Please share it with us here
The Month Ahead
Here are some of the meetings and events we have coming up. Hope to see you soon!
- 6/10, 6/17 and 6/24 Wednesday Evening Walk
- A Wednesday evening hike in the greater Portland, ME, area will be conducted every week through September.
- 6/4 and 6/18 Events Team Meetings
- Help us organize events to educate and engage Mainers across the state
- 6/16 Community Conversation : Virtual Power Plants
- A panel of experts will explain exactly what VPPs are, how they will help to control the cost of electricity during peak demand periods, and how Maine is beginning to implement a VPP through Efficiency Maine Trust.
- 6/24 Club Chat
- An opportunity for you to get updates from our Chapter staff team, to have your questions answered, and to offer your feedback and ideas.
VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITIES
Interested in helping to protect Maine's environment? Join us at our next volunteer orientation! No matter your background, we have a role for you--no experience necessary.
SUBMISSIONS
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