The blueprint for the postwar American way of life was written in the culs-de-sac of new developments like Levittown, N.Y., the Long Island community that calls itself the country’s first suburb. Beginning in 1947, developer Bill Levitt’s armies of builders churned out house after house, transforming a bare potato field into a centrally planned town that today is home to 53,000 people. Low-cost and low-interest loans enabled the working class to flee dense cities for the new suburbs, while cheap cars and cheaper gasoline supported their long commutes to urban workplaces. Three-bedroom houses, two cars in the driveway? The suburbs were about having more, and more became the American Dream.

But that manifestation of the American Dream came at a cost: soaring energy use, which is higher per capita in the U.S. than in almost any other country. “What is causing global warming is the lifestyle of the American middle class,” says Miami-based architect Andres Duany, a longtime proponent of sustainable design.

That makes what is happening in Levittown today so important. County officials, along with environmentalists and local businesses, recently launched the Green Levittown program, which aims to persuade residents to upgrade their homes, improving energy efficiency and cutting fuel bills. Volunteers signed up to canvass Levittown’s 17,000 homes starting Jan. 15. Their mission is to introduce the program and offer to schedule an energy audit (approximately $300) that can identify cost-effective renovations. Those who choose to participate–replacing an inefficient hot-water boiler, adding solar thermal power–can finance the upgrades with reduced-interest loans offered by a local credit union. “For all the attention paid to global warming in the media or internationally, this will be something to show to actual people that they can make a difference in their own lives,” says county executive Tom Suozzi.

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