Judge’s Power Problem

• by Matt Kirkegaard
• from the September 2008 issue of The Bulldog Press

For all of Judge’s accomplishments and successes there is a major problem few people are concerned bout. It is so large that it drains our school of thousands of dollars in resources every year. Instead of upgrading our classrooms or purchasing new equipment for our sports teams we are spending just under $95,000 annually to power the school. That means that every 10 years we send almost $1,000,000 to the electrical company. That isn’t even considering the money spent for natural gas burned to heat the school during the winter. That sounds like an astounding number, but when you understand just how large Judge is, you realize that all the lights and air conditioning units have to run off something. When you think about powering the computer labs and field lights you get an even larger perspective.

The question many are asking now, especially in light of the recent publicity of global warming and higher energy prices, is how to cut expenses and become more energy efficient.

“We have cut energy consumption but due to the rising prices of energy we have seen a leveling off of energy bills. If we would have done nothing though, the bills would have gone up substantially,” said Mr. Beisel, the Operations Manager at Judge, during an interview on August 22. In the same interview he told me what he saw as the main problems with our current energy consumption.

The school lacks central air conditioning aside from the cafeteria. Because individual classrooms use small air conditioning units, cooling the building is much less efficient than using a central unit. Added bonuses from getting a central AC would be availability of cool air to all classrooms and less maintenance with only one large unit to take care of rather than many small ones. All would welcome comfortable conditions and the lower bills would also be productive for Judge.

Another problem is lighting. For the last few years Judge has concentrated on this area of the underlying problem. Almost all the lights in the school are fluorescent now and those that aren’t are planned to become fluorescent soon. The school has also taken steps to switch out the incandescent bulbs our of the exit signs around the school and put energy efficient LED lights in their place. We have installed not only fluorescent lights but also smaller fluorescent lights for a more dramatic decrease in our power bills. Evidently, lighting seems to be one of the schools largest concerns when it comes to electrical usage.

Ken Adams, the Head of Maintenance for Judge, said, “We’ve just been trying to keep up with the new electrical appliances like computers and TVs that such power out of the school.” He also expressed concern about the possibility of an overload on our current power system as we gain more and more electrical running equipment.

But the last area that needs to change was the one the student and teacher body has the most control over. Simple things like turning off computers and lights would have a dramatic effect on the amount of energy that we use as a school. Do we really need all three banks of lights on when the sun is shining directly into the window? This would require an elevated level of awareness about energy, but effects would be immediate and can be done right now with out any large investment. Although this aspect of the electrical issue is harder to quantify or monitor, it is one that we all can be a part of. If anything is going to get done soon, it is more than likely that it will be teachers and students that will start movement towards great energy efficiency.