THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 29, 1996 TAG: 9608270139
SECTION: NORFOLK COMPASS PAGE: 04 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JON GLASS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 58 lines
City school officials last week unveiled a new program projected to cut the school system's energy costs by hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The so-called ``energy management program'' will begin this year as a pilot project in eight schools and expand systemwide over the next two years.
Officials project a 10 percent savings by 1999.
While talk of conservation doesn't carry the urgency of the 1970s' energy shortages and oil embargoes, the issue is being touted by school officials as a way to ferret out new money at a time when education dollars are getting harder to come by.
``In the past four to five years, there's been no significant increase in revenue, so we've had to look inward to save money,'' said Deputy Superintendent J. Frank Sellew. ``If we can generate savings in energy use, there will be carry-over into what we want to spend in other areas - computers, technology, teacher salaries and smaller class sizes.''
Energy and utility bills consume a significant chunk of change. In the year ahead, for example, the school system is expected to spend more than $5 million on energy costs, which have steadily increased, Joseph W. Savala told the School Board at its monthly meeting. Savala was hired in March as the city schools' first energy management supervisor. The projected expense for utilities this year is 22 percent higher than the $4.1 million spent three years ago.
Based on projected savings, the plan, if it were fully implemented this year, would save the system $500,000.
Ultimately, the plan's success will depend on principals, teachers, students and other employees to conserve energy use, said Savala.
``We are spending no money on this,'' Savala said. ``The biggest savings will come from people, if we can get the people to cooperate.''
To make sure building administrators take the program seriously, energy management at each school eventually will become part of a principal's annual evaluation. There are rewards: schools that reduce their energy costs will share in the savings to spend as they wish - with the superintendent's approval.
Most of the savings projected in the plan are based on educating employees and students about energy conservation practices, such as turning off lights when not needed. Schools also will have to set classroom thermostats on a constant temperature when in use - 71 degrees in the winter and 76 degrees in the warmer months.
School Board Chairman Ulysses Turner spoke approvingly of the plan but said the system needs more than conservation education, including increasing automation of energy controls and replacing old equipment with new, energy-efficient models.
School Superintendent Roy D. Nichols Jr. said that is the goal but that there's no money in the budget for it. Savings generated from the energy management plan will be used to pay for those improvements, he said.
``He doesn't have a budget,'' Nichols said of Savala. ``He's going to have to do it with savings.''
Savala, 35, hired at an annual salary of $53,503, previously worked as a plant engineer at Newport News Shipbuilding and was responsible for energy management, Sellew said. Savala built up ``a track record of substantial savings'' in his job at the shipyard, Sellew said. by CNB