Secretary Ian Bowles Congratulates the Winners of the Zero Energy Home Challenge...

Secretary Ian Bowles Congratulates the Winners of the Zero Energy Home
Challenge at the MA State House

BOSTON, June 29 /PRNewswire/ -- Massachusetts' investor-owned electric utility
companies -- National Grid, NSTAR, Unitil, and Western Mass Electric Company,
successfully completed an energy efficiency pilot program called the Zero
Energy Challenge. Five home builders competed to construct super
energy-efficient single-family homes and were awarded prizes based on their
results totaling $50,000. The awards event was held June 29, 2009 at 1:00pm at
the Massachusetts State House with guest speaker Energy and Environmental
Affairs Secretary, Ian Bowles.

"Winners of the Zero Energy Challenge are energy efficiency trail blazers who
are helping to build wider awareness and use of cutting edge techniques that
result in dramatic home energy savings," Energy and Environmental Affairs
Secretary Ian Bowles said. "The Challenge dovetails with Governor Patrick's
overall clean energy goals -- in particular, the Administration's work toward
adoption of zero net energy standards for new residential and commercial
construction by 2030."

The winners were selected based on their project scores on the nationally
recognized ENERGY STAR/HERS rating scale and used energy efficiency and
renewable energy technologies such as super-insulation, passive & solar
thermal designs, heat-recovery ventilation, mini-split heat pump technology,
super efficient windows, photovoltaic panels, and other energy-efficient
technologies to achieve their goals. The participants and their placement are
as follows:

1st Place Bick Corsa Tina Clarke/Doug Turners Falls/
$25,000 Construction Stephens Residence Western MA Electric
Company

2nd Place Carter Scott Transformations, Inc. Townsend/Unitil
$15,000

3rd Place Anne Perkins Rural Development, Greenfield/
$10,000 Inc. Western MA Electric
Company

4th Place Mark Sevier Sevier/Farb Sudbury/
Residence NSTAR Electric

5th Place Mary Marra Bread & Roses Lawrence/
Housing, Inc. National Grid

For more information including the final HERS indices for the projects, please
visit www.zechallenge.com. To promote replicability, the website will track
additional data and consumption information, as reported by the participants,
over the course of one year.

SOURCE ICF International

Marylou Einfalt of ICF International for Zero Energy Challenge,
+1-781-676-4076, meinfalt@icfi.com