Valencia College
IN-1: Innovation 1

Colleges typically provide energy saving tips and try to promote a culture of energy savings throughout. Valencia College had done this in the past, but since May 2011, we have also embarked upon an extremely aggressive behavioral savings program slated to save $1 million in energy costs per year. This is in addition to ongoing retrofits, building automation systems, and careful management of particularly our HVAC systems, which continue to achieve energy savings, and which are distinguished from the behavioral savings in this program through careful documentation.

Since September 2011 when the Energy Education Guidelines were officially adopted, the total energy savings on all campuses have been $407,500 compared to a baseline of the same 6 months of the previous year.  The savings represent $380,000 attributed to behavioral changes through utility (electric, water, gas) invoices. Convincing members of the staff and faculty to unplug at night, on weekends, and on holidays is one effort. Another is careful monitoring of building temperatures. Another is strategic scheduling so that buildings do not have HVAC running unnecessarily. This includes moving Humanities and math classes into science lab buildings (science lab classes cannot move elsewhere) during summer months when some buildings may be only partly occupied. Recognition of those faculty and staff actively participating in this money-saving and GHG-reducing effort is through an "energy heroes" program.