The Logan County Board of Education agreed to a second phase of a performance-based guaranteed energy savings project at the Tuesday, March 8, board meeting.
The project includes innovative technologies that will guarantee an energy savings of $191,494 annually. The program will allow the district to defer a large amount of the capital monies by generating savings from the operating budget and using those savings to pay for the agreed upon improvements.
Logan County school superintendent Dr. Kevin Hub said, “This latest project is another example of how our Board of Education strives to find ways to cut operational costs so that we can focus on the instructional needs in Logan County. In addition to the increased energy efficiency, we are also excited about the upgrades to our learning environments. LED lighting has shown to improve student achievement and we hope to see similar results here.”
In order to create an improved learning and teaching environment, Logan County is partnering with Harshaw Trane, a Kentucky-based energy services company. The project includes $8M in facility upgrades addressing critical needs such as HVAC and lighting. The full project includes:
*New HVAC, windows, LED lighting, ceilings at Adairville Elementary
*LED lighting upgrades in five schools and board office – Auburn, Chandlers, Lewisburg, Olmstead, Logan County High School
*Geothermal well fields and variable pumping conversions at Chandler’s and Olmstead
*Controls upgrade district wide
*Water conservation measures district wide
*Real-time energy and performance monitoring
Guaranteed savings as a result of the project will add over $5M in bonding capacity to go towards priorities on the school district’s facility plan. Logan County Schools will receive needed fiscal improvements, system reliability and centralized control, energy efficiency, a reduced carbon footprint and student and staff overall comfort as well as the potential for ENERGY STAR schools.
“The Logan County School Board is excited to be able to address the need for energy efficiency in our schools, and especially looks forward to seeing how these upgrades affect financial savings and staff and student achievement,” said Board Chairman Kenneth Robertson. “Through this program with Harshaw Trane, we are addressing some much needed improvements at Adairville School by adding a new HVAC system, new windows and new LED lighting. The LED lighting will be installed throughout our entire district.
“Harshaw Trane has proven to be a great partner to work with and we will be expanding our partnership by doing another energy project with them. The first energy project was a big success with over 127 percent savings of the guarantee.”