New Glasgow to take part in home retrofit program

This pilot program will be offered in partnership with Clean Foundation, the Halifax Regional Municipality and the Town of New Glasgow.

“Climate change impacts are affecting us at home,” said New Glasgow Mayor Nancy Dicks. “The Town of New Glasgow is actively working to improve our community’s adaptive capacity and support homeowners to implement resilience measures to protect their property. We are thrilled to be part of this exciting resiliency retrofit program, working alongside Halifax Regional Municipality and the Clean Foundation to build knowledge of flooding risks, prevention strategies and to improve climate resilience at home.”

Rachel Mitchell, climate change and sustainability manager with the town, said 10 homes in the town will participate.

“It’s a unique opportunity, I think, to work with a very strong organization in the Clean Foundation with the knowledge, resources and capacity that they have, as well as our counterparts at Halifax Regional Municipality,” she said.

Mitchell said the Clean Foundation approached the town with this idea.

“They came to us with an idea to focus on improving home resilience in the face of climate change specifically focused on over-land flooding,” she recalled. “With the changes we’re experiencing with precipitation and water running over land, how we could support homeowners to protect their homes and basements from water intrusion.”

Late last year, Mitchell said the Clean Foundation contacted the town and HRM to apply for funding together to deliver the program.

“Which will allow us to have an urban and rural lens on building climate resilience at home,” she noted.

Along with an emphasis on flooding, Mitchell said there are other aspects of the program.

“There’s also work involved around building knowledge and awareness, literacy around insurance and what this will look like going forward,” she said. “We’ll still be looking at properties in terms of things you can do to consider extreme heat, wildfire risk, strong winds, more frequent and extreme storms.”

Shannon Miedema, director of environment and climate change for HRM, said they were pleased to be partnering with Clean Foundation and the town on the project.

“This project supports the municipality’s climate action plan, HalifACT, which strives to help communities prepare and withstand current and future climate impacts, prioritizing people most at risk,” she said in a press release announcing the collaboration. “The learnings from this project will help inform a potential new program to help property owners reduce their energy demand, add renewable energy and increase resilience to climate impacts.”

Also on May 9, the province announced it is providing more than $5 million to Clean Foundation for the Community Climate Capacity Support Program, which will help communities act on their climate change priorities. Climate change co-ordinators will assist communities with their projects, the province noted.

“Nova Scotians are experiencing how climate change can impact their communities and homes,” Scott Skinner, president and chief executive officer of Clean Foundation, said in the press release. “The community climate capacity and resilient home retrofit programs provide residents with the knowledge and tools to act by increasing their homes’ resiliency and addressing specific community climate needs. These programs highlight the importance of community involvement in helping our province reach its ambitious environment and climate goals.”

Nova Scotia’s climate change plan is funding both programs, and the province said the programs will increase Nova Scotians’ knowledge and ability to act on climate-related priorities and help create more sustainable communities.

“Nova Scotians expect action to address the global climate change emergency and help them adapt,” said minister of Environment and Climate Change Tim Halman. “Our climate plan and risk assessment identified the importance of local action to respond to climate change and its impacts, such as flooding, and our communities have the expertise to understand where and how they need to take action on climate change. These programs will support more community-led action going forward.”