Efficiency Maine is reminding Maine firms that they can receive instant rebates of $4,500 on electric cars or pickups or $8,000 on electric commercial vans. The van rebate is for firms of all sizes; the car rebate is for firms owning 5+ vehicles. This is on top of the $7,500 federal tax credit. Details online.

We're pleased to announce that the Baxter Academy of Tech & Sci will be hosting our annual Winter Social on December 6. A Portland-based charter school with about 400 students, they play an important role in building the pipeline of prospective employees for firms in our community.

The Nature Conservancy-Maine was awarded a $605,000 grant from NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service to help restore habitats for endangered Atlantic salmon in Maine. Part of a multi-million dollar initiative, this round of funding is to complete the final engineering designs for the removal of the Guilford Dam and to restore the adjacent floodplain, which will reconnect habitat for Atlantic salmon in the Piscataquis River watershed. 

The Bigelow Lab in East Boothbay broke ground last week on their $30M Center for Ocean Innovation and Innovation which includes research labs, meeting space, and offices. It was designed by Harriman and the contractor is Consigli. Of the $30M, $12M came from the Federal government, $8M came from the Harold Alfond Foundation, and the reminder was individual and institutional philanthropy.

If you missed last week's announcement or the blurb in MaineBiz Daily Report on Oct. 13, E2Tech is pleased to share that Jacqui Baker has joined our team as our new Cleantech Policy and Program Manager and the successor to Rylee Ewald. Jacqui is a recent graduate of St. Lawrence University with a combined major in environmental studies and sociology, and enjoys rock climbing and has been skiing at Sunday River since she was four. Rylee is now managing education-related programming at GMRI.