Administrators at Dunklin R-V School District, located in Herculaneum, MO, in suburban St. Louis, expect recently completed infrastructure and lighting updates to save nearly $27,000 a year while improving the academic environment and avoiding future capital costs of up to nearly $300,000 a year.
The upgrades will aid in expanding the current early childhood program from one building to two, ultimately increasing revenue for the district. Upgrades were needed in four buildings throughout the district to reduce operational costs and to improve an aging physical plant.
In recognition of the district’s commitment to energy and operational efficiency and sustainability, Trane, a leading global provider of indoor comfort solutions and services and a brand of Ingersoll Rand, presented the district with the “Energy Efficiency Leader Award.”
“These upgrades not only increase energy and operational efficiency and reduce energy costs, they also enable the district to avoid significant capital costs which would have been needed to keep the buildings operational,” said Stan Stratton, superintendent of Dunklin R-V School District. “Most importantly, they improve the academic environment to help us better fulfill our chief objective: educating our students.”
The highest impact can be found in the Taylor Early Childhood Center and the Butterfly Building. The buildings needed major improvements to support revenue-producing early childhood education programs for the district.
Upgrades included modernizing the HVAC system at the Taylor Early Childhood Center. The project team installed high efficiency rooftop HVAC units, upgraded electrical systems and replaced a portion of the roof. In addition, the team replaced the domestic water piping and existing electric water heater.
Bathroom renovations were completed to ensure Americans with Disability Act compliance. Upgrades included replacing the plumbing fixtures, updating toilet fixtures with battery-operated flush valves, adding three station lavatory systems with battery-operated, infrared automatic operation, and installing a new epoxy floor coating over the existing ceramic tile floor. The project team also added new acoustical ceilings, and new exhaust fans and upgraded lighting, adding occupancy sensors so that lighting turns off automatically when not needed.
Lighting upgrades included retrofitting existing fluorescent lighting fixtures with energy saver T8 lamps and electronic ballasts. The covered walkway between the Taylor Building and Butterfly Building was modernized with maintenance-free materials and LED canned lighting fixtures for illumination in the evening hours.
Retrofits to the Butterfly Building included modernizing HVAC systems with high-efficiency rooftop units. The project team also replaced the entire roof and installed lighting upgrades. The hallway and classrooms also received new energy saver T8 lamps and electronic ballasts.
The project team upgraded the gymnasium and locker room at Senn-Thomas Middle School with cooling improvements, which included two new high efficiency (15 Seasonal Energy Efficiency Rating) packaged rooftop units, and high-efficiency lighting and occupancy sensors.
Upgrades at Pevely Elementary School included modernizing the HVAC systems to replace hot water boiler systems in two areas of the building and installing highly efficient lighting.
The district implemented building automation systems (BAS) in the Taylor Early Childhood Center, the Butterfly Building, Senn-Thomas Middle School and Pevely Elementary which provide centralized building control and enable remote access while monitoring results to help ensure that systems continue to run at optimum levels. The systems are integrated into a master BAS that also enables the facilities team to centrally manage district buildings remotely.