At its Spring 2015 General Assembly, the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) presented StopWaste with its Preserving and Protecting the Environment Award.

Stop Waste was honored for its work to educate Bay Area consumers about the importance of energy efficiency and increased awareness of energy savings programs. Its free energy consulting helps Bay Area multi-family property owners identify energy upgrades, qualify for rebates and access financing.

Enrollment in the program, developed and managed by StopWaste as part of the Bay Area Regional Energy Network's portfolio of energy saving programs, has outperformed other multifamily energy upgrade programs in California by a factor of three to four. Participating properties reduced their total energy use on average by 16 percent. And the program structure is unprecedented: for the first time in history, local governments have direct access to utility ratepayer funding for the design and implementation of environmental programs.

“Multi-family properties are often looked at as a challenge for implementing sustainable projects,” said StopWaste Deputy Executive Director Wendy Sommer. “But we know that it can be done when there’s a will to make it happen and a spirit of cooperation among partners coming together for a common goal.”

ABAG’s Growing Smarter Together Awards honor counties, cities and towns and their innovative efforts in revitalization, planning, innovation and technology to create sustainable communities and to promote conservation and green community efforts. The combined population of the nine Bay Area counties comprising ABAG is 7.4 million, higher than the population of 38 U.S. states.