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Austintown schools rank high for energy plans at 2 buildings
austintown
A suburban school district keeps an eye on energy as it builds two new schools.
The Austintown Local School District is following guidelines prescribed by the U.S. Green Building Council to make its new kindergarten-through-second and third-through-fifth-grade buildings environmentally responsible, healthier and less costly to operate.
Plans for the buildings have earned a silver certificate Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design ranking.
The district’s two new buildings will house 2,400 students in 245,482 total square feet and will feature energy- efficient lighting, heating and cooling systems. It will shrink the district’s footprint by consolidating five buildings into two.
“The buildings are going to look and smell better,” said Michele Kilroy, executive director of the Northeast Chapter of USGBC, about using standards outlined in LEED 2009. “Energy efficiency is a big part of that.”
LEED 2009 designated a checklist for districts to use in new construction. For every innovative standard used, points are earned. Certified ranking is achieved at 40-49 points, silver at 50-59, gold at 60-70 and platinum at 80 and above.
An air-cooling feature is one of the items. Mal Culp, the district’s supervisor of facilities and operations, thinks it is a unique energy-efficient addition to the district.
Variable Air Volume units that are outfitted with an ice storage bin will be installed in the new schools. During the evening, when electricity costs are less, the units will collect ice in a large container. During the day, the ice will cool the building.
“It will offer the district savings,” said Culp. “And I think its something will people will say, ‘Hey, let’s see what Austintown is doing with ice storage.’”
To add to the heating and air conditioning savings, each room will be designated a zone and can be warmed or cooled within four or five degrees of a preset temperature. The system won’t have to work to maintain a specific temperature throughout the entire building if it’s not needed.
Another feature will maintain healthier and cleaner air by conditioning and filtering it every 20 minutes.
Statistics show that 20 percent of people in the United States go to school every day, said Kilroy. Green schools improve attendance, test scores and have less employee turnover, she said.
Tracie Kaglic, project manager from Olsavsky Jaminet Architects Inc. of Youngstown, said the goal was to have the VAV system save 28 percent in heating costs.
Utility costs for the district per month are approximately $1,600 in the summer and $60,000 in the winter for gas, $32,000 for electricity and $7,000 for water. Individual utility consumption cannot be calculated for all buildings, because one meter is used at the main campus for all buildings.
To cut down on electrical and water consumption, sensors will be installed.
Motion and daylight-harvesting sensors will determine when a room is not in use and if natural light is enough illumination. Faucet sensors will control length of water flow. LEED requires a 20 percent reduction in water-use as a prerequisite on its checklist.
Rick Savors, chief of media relations at the Ohio Schools Facilities Commission, said several districts in Ohio have gotten silver and gold ratings and seen operational savings through innovations such as daylight harvesting.
The savings won’t happen overnight, he said.
Being LEED certified “means in the long term, the district has made a sound financial investment,” said Savors. “It’s smart fiscal responsibility on the part of the district.”
Construction on the two buildings is projected to cost $50 million and is being funded by the state and a 2.9-mill bond issue approved by voters in May 2010. The state’s contribution to the project is 47 percent of the cost.
Architect Ray Jaminet said 46 percent of the budget is used to pay wages for craftsmen and therefore remains in the community.