Lake Region Union High School

LOCATION: 317 Lake Region Road, Orleans, VT 05860-9446

STUDENTS: approximately 380 students in grades 9-12

PRINCIPAL: Andre Messier

ACTION TEAM LEADER: Topher Waring

MORE INFO: (802) 754-6521 or visit the school's website.

Energy and Efficiency Study for Lake Region - an impressive, 53-page study produced by Topher Waring's 2012-11 Physics class.

View the most recent report from Efficiency Vermont summarizing Lake Region's energy use.

BELOW is a list of the most recent accomplishments reported by the Action Team.

FALL 2011 + WINTER 2012

• LIGHT SENSORS INSTALLED: Installed daylight sensors in all of the east-facing classrooms. They will sense natural light and will turn off banks of lights (those closest to the windows) as enough natural light is sensed. We will be running a pilot in some of our classrooms with light sensors to see how much electricity we might save versus a room which leaves its lights on all day.
• REPLACE EXTERIOR DOORS: All exterior doors are scheduled to be replaced this summer with new insulated frames, doors and windows. (Currently light gaps are seen on almost all sets of doors; frames rotting out)
• OCCUPANCY SENSORS INSTALLED: Installed occupancy sensors in all of the bathrooms, closets and seldom-used rooms where lights are often left on.
• ELECTRONIC THERMOSTAT CONTROLS: Installed in all classrooms. Air exchangers will be next.
• REFRIGERATORS:Several smaller unit room refrigerators have been taken offline. A new Energy Star refrigerator/freezer for the culinary arts classroom will replace two ancient units this summer.
• OTHER LIGHTS: We are working with a local vendor and exploring (this past week) the changing out of all of the school's florescent lights and ballasts with more energy efficient super T-8s...early estimates are a 3-4 year payback if we do this....if the numbers pan out, it most likely will be a go project for the summer or fall.
• STUDENT PARTICIPATION: Lake Region's Green Team is growing! Planning a day-long alternative energy field trip (Moore Dam, Sheffield Wind Farm, local Farm methane digester, methane to electricty system at the local landfill, and a local solar-powered home) with students.

SPRING + SUMMER 2011

• EFFICIENT LIGHTING: Redid the gym lights in April and the parking lot lights and exterior door lights with LED fixtures in July. We also set 10 of the 13 exterior light poles on motion sensors. July electric consumption (-3000 KWH from July '10, $400 savings); August electric consumption (-5000 KWH from August '10, $700 savings); September consumption (-9000 KWH from September '10, $1200 savings).
• SOLAR SCOREBOARD: Student built solar-powered battery systems for two new scoreboards. Running electical power to each would have cost the school almost $20,000. The cost of each solar-powered system was about $1500 each. Tremendous savings, not to mention the great learning opportunity for the students involved. The girl who built one is now at UVM studying electrical engineering.
• INSULATED WINDOWS: Completed the installation of 66 thermal paned insulated windows in the academic wing (east side) and also replaced all of the main lobby glass with double-paned insulated glass this summer. The 28 windows on the west facing side of the academic wing were replaced in the summer of '10. The four windows in the cafeteria will be replaced in October. That leaves only then five office windows and the three maintenance side windows to replace next summer.
• INSULATED DOORS: We have ordered two new insulated overhead doors to replace the old steel doors down by the ag shop. We have received quotes to replace all of the exterior doors (original 1967) and frames with new insulated doors. This will be done in the summer of '12 with capital reserve funds already in savings.
• ON-DEMAND PUMPS: We have replaced the four circulating pumps in the boiler room with smaller horsepower motors. Also pumps that used to run 24/7 are now automatically set to run only on demand. We have retrofitted one of the huge boilers with a new burner as well as changed to motor. Rather than retrofit the second boiler, we are using the same amount of money for that retrofit to purchase two smaller boilers (800,000 btu each). These will allow us to stage our boilers usage based on need as determined by the newly installed outside temperature reset. The second boiler will essentially be taken off line, but will be there as a backup. The investment into the boiler/pump room is approximately $50,000. Our calculations figure that we will save between 4000-5000 gallons of oil/year plus electrical consumption reductions. Estimated 3-year payback. Another set of savings is that when we hired our new maintenance person, we hired someone with a master plumber's license. This person has been able to do almost all of the boiler room work. If we would have hired out the project it would have cost us more than double.