Veterans Have a New Mission: Making America More Secure Through Conservation Service and Energy Efficiency

Veterans who once crawled around attics and other claustrophobic spaces in homes in Iraq and Afghanistan, searching for hidden weapons and suspected terrorists, are now crawling through homes in the United States to track down air leaks and missing insulation. They are part of a new wave of veterans who are turning the skills and determination they developed in the military to a new mission: that of reducing Americans’ energy use and carbon emissions.

“We think veterans are uniquely qualified to lead the environmental restoration here at home,” said Kirsten Maynard of Veterans Green Jobs, which is based in Colorado. “Not only have they seen environmental destruction across the world; they also have technical skills and other kinds of work skills that allow them to do the really tough work that needs to be done - like go into homes and crawl in the attic and the basement. They’ve been trained by the military to do it, and they actually feel comfortable being in that kind of environment.”

Veterans Green Jobs runs a 9-week “Home Energy Auditor Training” (HEAT) for veterans, using a rapid, hands-on “military” style of training and a curriculum that was developed in collaboration with community colleges and industry organizations. Upon completion of the training, graduates receive college credits as well as a home energy efficiency certification. The first class of trainees graduated in June, and another class just began in October.

Geoffrey Talkington, who was among the first wave of HEAT trainees, described in a blog post on the Veterans Green Jobs website this spring how it made him feel to be able to help a low-income U.S. Air Force veteran from Alamosa, Colo., improve the efficiency of his home and reduce his energy bills: “It felt good to help him reduce his energy demand, but more importantly I felt honored to have made an instant friend when Henry sat back, smiled, and said: ‘Thank you for serving over there. You served so my daughter doesn’t have to.’ The bottom line is that we are making a difference, and it is rewarding to connect in such a profound way!”

Ray Curry, another HEAT trainee, described how his home visits as an energy auditor differ from those he participated in while in Iraq: “After deploying to Iraq, I have many-a-buried-memory of entering strangers’ homes. These invasive orders were to directly ensure the safety of my Unit and myself. However, typically finding nothing of note, they made me feel like a perpetrator. As a ‘Green Veteran’ I have now been equipped with the training, tools and team for a different much-needed mission…I am no longer the perpetrator, but the fixer.”

In addition to the HEAT training program, Veterans Green Jobs manages several other green programs for veterans, including the “Veterans Green Corps” initiative, which enlists veterans to do work like trail repair and fire mitigation in forests. The initiative is funded by the U.S. Forest Service. Veterans Green Jobs is also about to embark on an urban tree planting campaign called the “Veterans Urban Canopy Program,” which will see about 4,000 trees planted in the Denver metro area. The Canopy Program is funded by the city of Denver.

“After Vietnam, this country did not really take care of the veterans, and homelessness and drug abuse and other kinds of social problems were caused by the fact that veterans needed extra support they weren’t getting,” Maynard said. “One of our goals was to make sure that didn’t happen again. And we really believe strongly that meaningful work opportunities are one of the most healing aspects of what we can do for people who’ve served.”

Mark Fischer, who counseled Vietnam veterans for many years and now runs the Veterans Conservation Corps in Washington state, said his experiences confirm Maynard’s beliefs. “What I saw was that veterans who had lives that had more of a purpose seemed to do better. Saving the earth, and environmental and energy issues can be meaningful work,” Fischer said.

Fischer’s program, which is run out of the Washington Department of Veterans Affairs, puts veterans to work on habitat restoration and protection projects across Washington state. The program has been in existence for four years but has faced challenges recently because state budget cuts eliminated the stipends the program had paid veterans for their conservation efforts. The Veterans Conservation Corps is collaborating with other groups to apply for Recovery Act funds that would create more green jobs training opportunity for veterans in areas ranging from solar panel installation to the greening of the aerospace industry.

In the meantime, the Veterans Conservation Corps has inaugurated a new program, called Veterans Corps, which is modeled on the AmeriCorps program. Although Vet Corps has yet to be officially rolled out nationally, it is being beta tested in Washington state. Through Vet Corps, Fischer and his colleagues have placed some 45 veterans in community colleges and other institutions throughout the state for one-year assignments. Their goal is to help returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan enroll in community college programs, green jobs training programs and other activities that will help them figure out their goals for transitioning back to civilian life.

Vet Corps was part of Senator Ted Kennedy’s Serve America Act, which was signed into law by President Obama in April 2009.

“These veterans served and protected their country while abroad,” said Alex Cornell du Houx, an Iraq war veteran who also serves in the Maine legislature. “Through veterans green jobs programs, we have the opportunity to continue serving and protecting our country by reducing our carbon pollution to make America more secure.”

Cornell du Houx recently invited one of the founders of Veterans Green Jobs to Maine to look at the possibility of launching a program at Southern Maine Community College. His interest in green jobs stems from issues he’s worked on in the legislature, like efforts to turn a former naval air station into a renewable energy hub. But they also stem from his experience in Iraq.

“When I was deployed in Fallujah with the marines, we came across a line of cars, trucks and tractors that were bumper-to-bumper as far as the eye could see. They were waiting there all night and risking their lives for gasoline and diesel. It really struck me how vulnerable and dependent they were on this single source of energy. Likewise, it made me think about how dependent we are and how it puts our security at risk,” du Houx said.

Cornell du Houx is part of an effort by national security and veterans organizations to draw attention to the national security threat that is created by climate change. Their new project, Operation Free, held an event in Washington, DC in September, which was followed by a bus tour by veterans in October. “The reason why national security organizations are taking this as a serious threat, is that not only are we [the United States] dependent on oil, but the conflicts that arise from famines, floods and droughts [caused by climate change] multiply the threat of current conflicts and create instability,” du Houx said.

Operation Free is working to convince the Senate to pass strong clean energy and climate measures. And while they pursue U.S. energy independence on the policy front, hundreds of veterans are pursuing the same goals in local green jobs training programs and post-training job placements.

“It’s a revitalization of a mission they had in Iraq and Afghanistan,” said Fischer of the Veterans Conservation Corps. “Once they left the military, that mission is gone, and it’s a big loss. When they lose that purpose it can be disheartening and disorienting. We try to create a meaningful job - for a purpose-driven life.”