For this project, the class was split into groups and each group was given a unique topic with which we were tasked to research. The overall goal of the project was to "audit" the school based on which topic we were given. My group was the energy group; this means that our task was to find out how much energy our school uses, and find ways that we could reduce it. We began by trying to find out how much energy our school uses, but sadly we were unable to find any useful information at all. Everyone that we talked to all said the same thing; that they had no idea where any information related to our schools energy consumption. But we did know that our school is partially powered by solar energy, due to the large number of solar panels visible in front of the school. Sadly, we were unable to find any information on this either. There was a screen showing how much energy the solar panels generated a few years ago but we learned that this, as well as the solar panels, were all controlled by some company that no one knew how to get into contact with. Since we were unable to find any information on our own school, we took to the internet to try to find information on other schools. Thankfully, we were able to find the average energy use of schools in America. It can be viewed below. What we discovered is that lighting the schools consumes the most energy, with cooling and ventilation coming in second, while everything else isn't even worth mentioning or focusing on.
Since lighting is what's consuming the most energy, we began to think of ways that we could reduce this number. Here are some of our ideas:
LED lightbulbs are the best alternative to conventional incandescent and fluorescent bulbs. They’re more energy-efficient, have longer lifetimes, don’t emit UV rays, and can even come in fun colors. They provide more light, all while consuming up to more than half the amount of energy as other types of bulbs. Although they may cost a bit more than fluorescent and incandescent lights, they have high initial costs and low lifetime costs as they can last over 10x longer, which makes them a money-saving alternative. source: https://www.stouchlighting.com/blog/fluorescent-vs-led-vs-cfl
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Austin Chavoen |