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Flip That Switch: Schools Save Energy

Posted on: Tuesday, 11 April 2006, 12:00 CDT

By Zachary K. Johnson, The Record, Stockton, Calif.

Apr. 11--Bob Corsaro asked a few fifth-graders to hold thermometers on different sides of their classroom at Art Freiler Elementary School in Tracy on a recent chilly, rainy morning.

The students told the energy management director of Tracy Unified School District that they all measured the room at approximately 73 degrees Fahrenheit.

Corsaro radioed the district office, and a voice on the other side said the reading was the same at the central computer.

The district staffer also said the classroom's fan was on, its door was closed and the thermostat was set to 68 degrees.

"We've found that monitoring the energy at the schools very closely can save us money," Corsaro told the students.

He estimates district energy polices have saved about $650,000 since they were put in place to adjust to a harsh budget climate in 2003, when other school districts in San Joaquin County also began changing how they dealt with energy. Measures the districts enacted have saved hundreds of thousands of dollars since.

Taking steps to conserve energy isn't new. School districts were looking for ways contain energy costs even before the state's energy crisis saw rates leap in 2001. Tracy Unified has been doing energy-conscious retrofits since 1983, but 2003 gave Tracy Unified a renewed sense of urgency, Corsaro said.

The school board asked its staff that year to save $150,000 annually. By the end of the 2004-05 school year, the district had done even better. It had lowered its natural-gas and electricity bill by $259,000, mostly by getting people to turn off lights, shut doors and refrain from cranking up the air conditioning, Corsaro said.

Stockton Unified School District also fought the budget crunch by reducing its energy usage. But the district really started conserving in 1999, when it spent $3million to retrofit its schools with less-energy-hungry lighting, said Art Hand Jr., the district's executive director of support services. That saves about $250,000 a year, he said.

By 2003, the district had a conservation plan in place to get people, among other things, to keep lights turned off when they weren't needed. The plan cuts the district's expenses by about $400,000 a year, Hand said.

Manteca Unified has lowered its electricity and gas bill since adopting an energy-saving plan in 2003. At the time, the district determined that putting together a policy to turn lights, heating and air conditioning off after school would save $227,000 a year.

A recent analysis done by Pacific Gas and Electric Co. shows that Manteca Unified's energy use per square foot has decreased as it adopted energy-saving measures. It's a mark of success that the district is able to keep its energy bills stable as it adds schools, Assistant Superintendent of Business Services Michael Dodge said. "As we continue to add square footage of classroom space, our energy bills are the same."

Part of the savings come from the newer schools themselves, which are built to be more energy-efficient, he said.

That, along with replacing old electrical equipment, is also how Lodi Unified has cut its energy costs, said Mamie Starr, that district's assistant superintendent of facilities and planning.

Because rates fluctuate, it's difficult to put a dollar amount on the savings, she said. "It's as much about cost avoidance as cost savings." Energy-efficient designs for the district's recently opened Ronald E. McNair High School earned a state grant of about $1million toward its construction, she said. Features include a gym equipped with sensors that dim the lights when enough sun shines through skylights, she said.

Though conservation and efficiency save money, utility bills are bound to creep back up as the prices of gas and electricity escalate.

The effort to conserve energy and invest in making schools efficient acts as a buffer to those rising costs, Hand said.

"What it really becomes is a cost offset," he said. "We're able to minimize (the impact of) increasing and sometimes wildly escalating costs."

Contact reporter Zachary K. Johnson at (209) 833-1142 or zjohnson@recordnet.com

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Source: The Record

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