Next month's Rockland boat show will have a 'green' theme
Photo/ Laurie Schreiber
The Maine Boat & Home Show, Aug. 9-11 in Rockland, has implemented a number of green practices. Exhibitors with green products will also be at the show.
The Maine Boat & Home Show, Aug. 9-11 in Rockland, is making new efforts this year in its goal to become a zero-waste event.
The initiatives include digital ticketing, reducing paper mailings, not using plastic entry wristbands, and asking return exhibitors to reuse plastic exhibitor badge holders, according to a news release. Exhibitor lanyards are reusable. In the Awlgrip Exhibitor Lounge, the water bottles are recyclable and returnable.
"We've been moving for a long time toward a goal of being a low-impact event,” show organizer John K. Hanson Jr. said in the release.
In addition, a new presence this year will be ScrapDogs Community Compost, a local operation that collects food and yard waste from midcoast Maine residents and businesses and processes the waste into compost, then sells the finished product locally.
"We approached the show knowing that a significant amount of waste must be generated when you have thousands of folks enjoying one location over a weekend,” Davis Saltonstall, co-founder of ScrapDogs with Tessa Rosenberry, said in the release. “It seemed a perfect showcase for us to help reduce that, and also spread the word about the joys and benefits of composting.”
There will be ScrapDogs food-waste collection receptacles in place for commercial and public use at the show.
“Then we’ll take these organic materials away from the event site and compost them,” said Saltonstall. “Some attendees and exhibitors may be unfamiliar with composting, but we’ll be on hand all weekend to coach them regarding what materials are accepted in compost containers. We’ll have a booth near the Food Court where we can answer questions, and we’ll also offer a really fun recycling game for the younger attendees.”
Green exhibitors
A number of exhibitors will also have environment-friendly offerings on hand. Some of them are:
• Maine Cat, Bremen-based maker of high-performance composite multihull sailboats, has partnered with E-TECH Electric Drives, manufacturer of electric propulsion drives with hydroelectric generation. Maine Cat’s MC 38 LS-E can make its own clean electric power while sailing with the drives.
• The Pisces 21 by Classic Boat Shop offers an optional inboard electric drive equipped with either two AGM batteries or a lithium-ion battery and fast charger.
• Maine Ocean School’s cordless canoes: As part of a summer session before the show, students will design and build a vessel, then power it with two 18-volt cordless electric power-tool heads. Show-goers can learn all about it at the school’s booth in Area A. There will also be an on-water demonstration on the boat docks on Saturday afternoon.
• The diesel-electric steamship America will be at the Icon Dock all day Friday. The vessel is nearly 59 feet long, yet propulsion comes from two 60-kilowatt electric drives while two diesel generators charge the battery bank. The approach is similar to a hybrid car's, but the combustion engines charge batteries instead of turning the props directly. America was built from a bare hull using repurposed materials, including wood from discarded parts of houses and buildings.
• Maine Energy Systems, which specializes in wood-pellet boilers and furnaces, will be in Outdoor West. Built in Bethel, its boiler design was acquired from ÖkoFEN, a leader in automatic wood pellet boiler design and technology.
• For a dozen years or so, Stanley Subaru, the exclusive Vespa and Piaggio Dealer in Maine, has brought a fleet of energy-efficient scooters to the show.
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