The pace of change along the Maine coast may not be rapid, but it’s steady. The changes may not be sweeping, but — like all the little mainland towns and island communities that are this coast — they add up to something very large.
Walk into a supermarket just about anywhere these days and you’ll find evidence of “green” thinking, be it sections devoted to organic produce, lighting designed to be more energy efficient or less visible efforts to lower heating and cooling costs. Hannaford Bros. and Whole Foods, both of which operate stores on the Maine coast, recently won praise for their efficiency efforts from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Wal-Mart, often criticized for its contributions to sprawl and the demise of downtowns, has also earned high marks for its energy consciousness.
Moving up on the food chain, so to speak, we report this month on the efforts of an entire town, Cranberry Isles, to embrace “green” technologies and move away from older, carbon-intensive means of producing electricity. Cranberry Isles voters at their annual town meeting passed a series of articles to promote an innovative environmental agenda, including purchasing electricity for municipal needs from a renewable energy provider. By signing a voluntary pact the town became the 811th municipality (and one of the smallest) in the country to participate in the U.S. Mayors Agreement to “do whatever we can to slow down global warming and reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” according to the first selectman. Not stopping there, the town agreed to spend $10,000 to support projects that reduce negative environmental impact and increase stewardship, including a wide-ranging energy feasibility study. All in all, an impressive effort.
Interest in the effects of climate change isn’t limited to the Cranberry Isles or Hannaford supermarkets, however. A program called “Human Dimensions of Climate Change” is organizing regular meetings to learn what, if any, climate change-related effects fishermen are observing along the coast. The project “seeks to connect theories of climate change to local, tangible fishery data,” we report — larger lobsters being caught Downeast; inconsistent dates in recent years for the annual lobster “shed.”
In the coming months and years we can expect to feel the effects of innovations in the marketplace as well as the environment: new ways of marketing seafood, for example. A panel at last month’s Fishermen’s Forum focused on ways fishermen can market their catches directly to the public via farmers’ markets, roadside stands or the Internet, bypassing middlemen who always take a share of the profits. At the Fishermen’s Forum and the International Boston Seafood Show the previous week, there was emphasis on the power of “branding” for seafood, be it Maine lobsters or Gulf of Maine shrimp.
Inventions — from the electric “stunner” for squeamish lobster eaters to a new generation of packaged seafood products to new kinds of bait — were the order of the day at the Boston Seafood Show. A device to improve the efficiency of lobster traps and even a lawn chair made from trap wire were on display as well: no shortage, it seemed, of new things to try their wings in the marketplace. Back in Camden, Maine, meanwhile, the harbormaster was demonstrating his invention to help haul moorings for inspection.
Finally, not all this recent activity necessarily involved new things. One very old product — the Pilot Cracker — is in the news again, as its maker reportedly threatens to remove it, yet again, from grocery store shelves. But because people around here think for themselves and don’t take ill-considered change lying down, we can expect a full-throated cry to keep the crackers in our lives. Some change is good; some isn’t.