State obligates roughly $36 million for municipal energy resilience projects; BGS reports 531 audits, 246 project awards

Buildings and General Services (BGS) officials told the Legislature’s Energy and Digital Infrastructure Committee on April 4, 2025, that they have obligated nearly $36 million of a $45 million Municipal Energy Resilience Program to implement energy-efficiency and resilience measures at 246 municipal buildings across Vermont.

The program, established by Act 172 in 2022 and funded primarily from the American Rescue Plan Act State Fiscal Recovery Fund, funded assessments of municipal infrastructure and awarded implementation grants after the audits identified measures such as insulation, air sealing, electrification and resilience systems including solar and battery backup. "We were required to obligate all of the dollars ... and we obligated every penny," said Brian Sewell, state energy program manager with the Department of Buildings and General Services.

BGS said the program delivered audits on a large scale: officials reported 237 municipal applications that covered 665 municipal buildings, of which 531 assessments were awarded and completed. The assessments were split into 330 Level 2 commercial-grade audits and 201 Level 1 assessments; officials said Level 1 assessments do not require historic utility bills and therefore do not support later loan eligibility because there is no baseline to calculate payback.

Program design and…