FIRST AN ENERGY AUDIT

Energy audit is first step toward 'green' upgrades for City-County Building
Rich Lord, January 18, 2010 (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)

"There's so much energy being wasted in the City-County Building, Downtown, that you can actually hear it…[In the basement] beneath Pittsburgh's seat of government, steam pipes hiss and drip, sauna-like air whooshes into chilly chambers when doors swing open, and electrical transformers buzz like hives…

"…[An audit of] the 250,000-square-foot building…[revealed] all manner of inefficiency. Start with 220 city-owned air conditioners (not counting the ones in Allegheny County offices in the same building) sticking out from metal-framed windows with duct-taped cracks…the least efficient mechanism for cooling a space…[as well as ] cast iron radiators on some floors, the space heaters under many desks, the mishmash of lighting options, the uninsulated walls, the electrical switching gear installed in 1957 -- all inside an ornate and historic shell…"

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"…[The audit, which will cost] the city up to $120,000, is the first step in a project that will eventually enlist at least $3.4 million in federal funds to lower the $1.7 million-a-year bill for energy and heating in the 95-year-old building…[The report] is due in April, and is a big part of Mayor Luke Ravenstahl's bid to "green" city government.

"The city also is developing efficiency improvement plans for 100 other buildings of the 330 it owns. The city's flagship building, though, will get the first and most attention…The federal energy efficiency grant, like those distributed to Allegheny County and other governments in a nationwide stimulus program, was based on the city's population and area, and will go entirely to the flagship building. At $12 for each square foot in the nine-floor building with two basements and three half-floors, it will get the transformation started, but not finished."

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"The core of the heating system -- which uses steam to heat water which then flows through radiators -- may remain, but the leaky radiators might be replaced with more modern distribution systems…[Big cuts can be made in the] annual heat bill just by changing the temperature of the steam-heated water…Other changes are easier, and could pay for themselves over a few years by shaving the city's utility bills…

"The savings [from many changes in lighting for efficiency, for timed thermostats or centralized heating and air conditioning controls, and motion sensors tied to lighting] can be used to pay for more improvements…[More] grants from the federal government and other sources [could] pay for more fixes…[after investing] $300,000 for less-extensive reviews of 100 other city buildings, from police stations to firehouses…"