Meet the small business owners electrifying Maine’s rural coast
In Casco Bay’s remote waters, electric workboats and the aquaculture innovators who operate them are putting marine electrification to the test.
Julia Tilton / The Daily Yonder
Grist | September 21, 2025
By Julia Tilton
(originally published by The Daily Yonder)
Editor’s Note: Reporting for this article was made possible by the Guerry Beam Memorial Reporting Grant award from the Institute for Journalism and Natural Resources.
On a sunny, 85-degree day in August of 2025, some 9,300 oysters were loaded into ice-filled containers on southern Maine’s Casco Bay. The boat shuttling them from the warm, shallow waters of Recompense Cove to the marina two miles away hummed quietly. Notably missing: the roar of an engine and the smell of diesel.
Heron, the boat in question, is a 28-foot aluminum vessel that runs on two 100% electric outboards, the motors that hang off of small and medium-sized boats. It’s one of the first commercial workboats in the United States to use electric outboards. The vessel officially splashed into the waters of South Freeport, Maine on July 17, 2025. The moment, though, had been years in the making. It required a coalition of industry-wide partners, a $500,000 U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) grant, and at least that much in matching funds from the operating businesses’ cost share agreement and philanthropic investments through the Rockland, Maine-based Island Institute, the Maine Technology Institute, and others. Altogether, the $1 million private-public investment covers Heron’s $425,000 sticker price and the costs to install two high-capacity shoreside chargers. A portion of these funds also supports data collection and research to assess the viability of electric technology in the greater aquaculture industry.
