The Town of East Hampton is dedicated to protecting, preserving, and enhancing the community’s natural resources, landscapes, and safety in the face of climate change, and is leading by example by adopting and promoting sustainable practices.  

For a comprehensive list of the Town’s accomplishments in Energy and Sustainability click here: 

http://ehamptonny.gov/DocumentCenter/View/14244/Town-of-East-Hampton-Accomplishments-in-Energy-and-Sustainabilitypdf

Town Hall Campus

          Pollinator Gardens

At the Town Hall campus, a wildflower meadow-in-progress along with perennial and native plant gardens create a “pollinator pathway” for bees. Gardens that attract and sustain pollinator species such as bees and butterflies play an important role in our local ecosystem, as pollinators are crucial for the successful growth of food crops and other plants.

 Landscape maintenance at all town properties is done without chemicals or pesticides, and a solar-powered lawn mower is used at Town Hall. 

A new pollinator garden is also in progress, thanks to a public/private partnership with ChangeHampton, and will serve as a demonstration garden for public education on eco-friendly plantings. Learn more here: http://ehamptonny.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=610

          Electric Vehicle Fleet and Charging Stations

East Hampton Town adopted a 'fleet efficiency policy' in 2020, calling for the replacement of internal combustion vehicles with electric vehicles over time, and setting minimum MPG standards for all town vehicles. 

To encourage members of the public to choose electric vehicles (EVs), a number of public EV charging stations have been installed: 6 at the Town Hall campus, 4 in the Amagansett municipal parking lot, and 12 in the municipal lot at South Euclid Avenue in Montauk (8 of which are Tesla superchargers). 

The Town is continuing to upgrade our infrastructure to accommodate the community's transition to EVs with an additional 10 dual-port charging stations coming to the Town Hall campus. Design and installation for the new charging stations will be funded by a NYS Department of Environmental Conservation Zero Emissions Vehicles grant, and is expected to be completed during 2023.

Read the Fleet Efficiency Policy: http://ehamptonny.gov/DocumentCenter/View/7548/Resolution-2020-1176-EH-Fleet-Efficiency-Policy?bidId=

          Parks Department Solar Roof
Solar panels installed on the roof of the East Hampton Town Parks Department building are slated to go on line at the end of 2022, producing enough energy to power the building as well as provide extra energy to feed into the power grid.

          Smart Thermostats and LED Lightbulbs
The Town of East Hampton has updated existing lighting fixtures with energy efficient LEDs in 23 of its buildings and installed programmable smart thermostats in 5 buildings -- at no cost to the Town through a PSEG and South Fork Peak Savers energy efficiency incentive program. These upgrades will reduce electricity consumption by 100s of 1000s of kilowatt hours and  save the town 10s of 1000s of dollars in energy costs annually.

Energy Efficiency and Sustainability

          Energize East Hampton

The town's website at https://energizeeh.org/ provides information about East Hampton's 100-percent renewable energy goals, and strategies for achieving them, along with tips for business and homeowners. Sections address home retrofits, green building, energy storage, energy demand management, renewable heat, community choice aggregation, community microgrids, offshore wind energy, solar parking lots, and community solar, and outline the Solarize East Hampton program, through which EH property owners can benefit from community group pricing when installing rooftop solar panels.

A series of free educational webinars addresses topics such as home energy assessments and efficiency, electric vehicles, and solar power. Past presentations can be viewed at https://energizeeh.org/outreach-events/

A webinar on the benefits of all-electric homes presented on Dec. 7, 2022, can be viewed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQf3VDVhh0o

          Accabonac Solar Farm
The Accabonac Solar Farm in Springs is the first megawatt-scale solar farm on Long Island's South Fork. It was developed by AES Distributed Energy on Town-owned land that was previously a brush dump, repurposing previously unusable land for a sustainable purpose. The energy produced by the solar panels feeds directly into the East Hampton power grid for use by the community.

          Smart Street Lighting with LEDS
The Town has partnered with the New York Power Authority (NYPA) under the Governor's Smart Street Lighting NY initiative to replace existing streetlights with lights using LED bulbs. This project is projected to reduce our streetlight energy consumption and energy costs by more than 60 percent.

Water Quality Improvement Projects

East Hampton Town continually works to identify and address threats to the quality of our ground and surface waters

Learn more about the Clean Water East Hampton program: https://ehamptonny.gov/640/Clean-Water-East-Hampton-Program?fbclid=IwAR2qweWmrO_iLh2U674E4awOSTcJN2tiBAsM8KxIXU9jLJdVxbibcHJisG4

          Tanbark Creek: An Innovative Pilot Program to Remove Nitrogen Pollution in                                 Groundwater

A new EH Town water quality project with Cornell Cooperative Extension scientists is using an innovative method to treat nitrogen in groundwater at Town-owned properties along the shoreline of Tanbark Creek near Three Mile Harbor. Read more: http://ehamptonny.gov/DocumentCenter/View/14353/Tanbark-PRB-Fact-Sheet_MGredline

A Coastal Community's Approach to the Impacts of Climate Change
The Town of East Hampton is committed to pursuing climate mitigation and adaptation initiatives that reduce our community's contributions to climate change while addressing its current impacts and carefully planning for future changes to our environment.

          Coastal Assessment Resiliency Plan (CARP)
As a coastal community, East Hampton is vulnerable to damage from tidal inundation and loss of coastline as sea levels rise and the frequency of severe storms increases. The CARP plan assesses our vulnerabilities and recommends plans, policies, and procedures to increase our resilience and ability to adopt to the impacts of climate change. "The goal of CARP is to prepare for a prosperous and vibrant future by facing the challenges of rising seas and more virulent storms head on," said EH Town Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc.
Coastal Assessment Resiliency Plan Vision Statement: http://www.ehamptonny.gov/DocumentCenter/View/12138/TOEH-CARP-Vision-Statement-2019
More info and to read the Plan: http://ehamptonny.gov/574/Coastal-Assessment-Resiliency-Plan

April, 2022 Press Release on the CARP Draft Plan:/DocumentCenter/View/15612/Press-Release-----CARP-Draft-Plan-Apr-2022

          Living Shorelines in Montauk: Wildlife and Resilience Improvements
In December, 2022, the Town of East Hampton was awarded a $350,000 grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to develop plans for living shoreline projects along Lake Montauk and Fort Pond, areas of high risk that are subject to flooding.  A living shoreline creates a protected and stabilized coastline edge using natural materials such as plants, sand, and shellfish reefs, which can absorb wave energy and prevent inland flooding. This type of natural adaptation to impacts of climate change is among the recommended actions in East Hamptons Coastal Assessment Resiliency Plan.

Learn more: https://ehamptonny.gov/DocumentCenter/View/15617/Living-Shorelines

Read the Press Release: https://ehamptonny.gov/DocumentCenter/View/15592/Living-Shoreline-grant-pr-rel-Dec-6-2022

Leadership, Policies and Goals

In 2014, the East Hampton Town Board adopted a policy of working to meet 100 percent of annual community-wide energy consumption in all sectors (electricity, heating, and transportation) with renewable energy sources by 2030, becoming the first municipality in NYS to adopt such progressive energy sustainability goals. http://ehamptonny.gov/382/Energy-Sustainability

In 2021, the Town declared that a climate and ecological emergency exists and resolved to make climate mitigation and the elimination of greenhouse gas emissions a guiding principle and objective of all municipal operations and decisions. http://ehamptonny.gov/DocumentCenter/View/8256/Resolution-Endorsing-the-Declaration-of-a-Climate-Emergency-Town-of-East-Hampton A Fleet Efficiency Policy adopted in 2020 outlines the commitment to the use of Electric Vehicles (EV) for the town’s vehicle fleet. 

Our Energize East Hampton program, at https://energizeeh.org/,  connects residents and business owners with programs that offer energy and money-saving options while helping to achieve the Town’s 100-percent renewable energy goal. 

 Recognition

The Town has been designated a NYS Climate Smart Community,( http://ehamptonny.gov/612/Climate-Smart-Communities) as well as a Clean Energy Community (http://ehamptonny.gov/557/Clean-Energy-Communities). 

Grants and Awards