With the school district’s costs for everything from health insurance to fuel rising and an expected $100 million shortfall in next year’s budget, there appears to be a glimmer of good news.
The school district has saved about $4 million since 2008 on its utility bills through a program that aims to change the energy-using behaviors of schools rather than investing money in capital improvements such as new lights and air conditioners.
“That money goes back into the general fund,” said Lee Kapp, the district’s utilities manager. “The less we spend on utilities, the more they can spend on textbooks or whatever they want.”
The savings the past three school years represent only a fraction of the district’s daunting bills for power, water, garbage and other utilities. The utility bills for the past school year were about $45 million, Kapp said.
The district does not have much money to retrofit schools with more efficient lights, so officials instead decided to focus on changing how employees use electricity, said Joe Sanches, the district’s chief of facilities management.
A big part of the plan is what Sanches calls the “20 percent rule.” When custodians cleaned a school at night, they would fan out over the entire school, Sanches said.
Under the new rules, officials use a computerized central control system that can regulate the temperature and lights of most of the classrooms in the district to turn off the lights and air to about 80 percent of the school, Sanches said.
Then the custodians focus on cleaning the remaining 20 percent at once, moving section to section through the night .
Kapp said the school district also instructed employees at schools to cut their power usage between 3 and 6 p.m. in the summer months by concentrating summer camps or other activities in one part of the building. Reducing usage during those hours allowed the district to take advantage of reduced rates through Florida Power and Light Co. that have saved it $400,000.
A big part of the savings has come from getting school principals more involved by showing them their school’s utility bills and how electricity is being used at their school, Sanches said.
“They don’t pay those bills, so they might not think about that,” Sanches said.
The district’s utility management department also has a team that goes to schools at night to analyze what lights and computers employees left on after school ended, Kapp said. Then the team meets with principals to show them how much energy use could be reduced at their school.
Sanches said he also has made it in the best interest of principals to save energy. Starting this year under a new incentive program, schools that save at least 5 percent on their power bills over the previous year will get back 15 percent of those savings to use for programs at the school, Sanches said. The most efficient schools in the district also will receive grants.
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