Kennebunk's downtown Waterhouse Center to get a solar installation
PHOTO / TINA FISCHER
The Waterhouse Center hosts events year-round in downtown Kennebunk.
The town of Kennebunk has won a $75,000 state grant to install 124 rooftop solar panels on the busy Waterhouse Center.
The open-sided, 12,000-square-foot pavilion is located at 51 Main St., in the heart of the downtown. It is used year-round for ice skating, pickleball, craft shows and other events.
The Waterhouse solar project is expected to cost $107,000 and take up to two years to complete. The town expects the pavilion to be available for community use during the rooftop installation.
The state grant comes from the Community Resilience Partnership, which is administered by the Governor’s Office of Policy Innovation and the Future and supports projects addressing improved energy efficiency and climate mitigation.
Grants are awarded each spring. This year a total of $8 million went to 166 communities across the state. Since the program’s inception in 2021, 263 towns have received $15.8 million in grants funding.
'Resilience' grants
In 2024 the state Legislature appropriated $5 million to support community resilience grant projects in the wake of the winter storms that brought severe damage across the state. Additional funding that year came from a $69 million climate resilience grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
A portion of those funds will be distributed over the next five years to support planning and projects to address climate issues.
Kennebunk established a climate-action plan in 2024, outlined in a 160-page report, to address climate change, after the town’s beachfront was severely impacted by a series of winter storms that caused flooding and damage to roads and sidewalks, some of which are still being repaired.
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