Warren Wilson College
OP-5: Building Energy Efficiency

In 2007 Warren Wilson College committed, via its ACUPCC Climate Action Plan, to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions 80% by 2020. Previous greenhouse gas inventories and STARS filings have used 2007-2008 data for the baseline year. We are changing the baseline to our last greenhouse gas emissions inventory data gathered for 2013-2014. The reason for this change is that our original emissions goals included the use of carbon offsets to reach our goals. Since 2013-2014, we no longer use carbon offsets to achieve our reductions. We have adopted this new baseline for future goal setting.

Our 2008 Climate Action Plan directs us to practice energy efficiency and we are steadily making progress toward our goals. At Warren Wilson, the land itself—the 300-acre working farm, 11-acre garden, and 600-acre managed forest—serves as a living laboratory for the sustainable, energy-wise practices that are brought to life through academics and our work program. Students study methane reduction/carbon sequestration practices on our farm; they work in our Informational Technology division, helping to educate the community about paper-reduction and energy-saving computing practice; they round up an annual 68 tons of food and vegetative waste for composting; they poster their dorms and other campus buildings about reducing energy use. Student research and student-led campus energy-efficiency initiatives have a history at Warren Wilson of leading the campus to best practices.

Several buildings on campus have timer-regulated temperature systems. These buildings are programmed as 'occupied' between the hours of 7am and 5pm. The rest of the time, the heating/cooling system only turns on above 90 degrees F or below 55 degrees F. Hallways and stairwells have motion-sensing lighting. Several dorms have energy-monitoring systems which allow motivated students to track dorm energy use. Information Technology sets all campus computers to energy-efficiency settings.

We have been an EPA Green Lights Partner which has helped to guide campus lighting conversions over the years. In 2014 the college replaced our campus street lighting, and our Cannon Lecture Hall with LEDs. We are currently in the process of continuing to convert all campus indoor and outdoor lighting to LED's.

The LEED-Platinum Ecodorm offers passive solar water heating. A hallway that runs the length of the Witherspoon science building was designed passive solar to help heat the building. The LEED-Gold Village Dorms have slab radiant heat. Jensen academic building, the LEED-Gold Orr Cottage office building and Laursen office building are heated and cooled with geothermal systems.

There have been significant and effective energy reduction strategies implemented in the past five years. In 2017, the College drilled thirteen new thermal wells for the Jensen academic building's HVAC system, doubling the number of wells and bringing the total number of wells to twenty-six.

In 2017, we also doubled the wells and drilled two more for the Laursen office building to bring its total number to four. The new wells brought both buildings up to full capacity as designed by the engineer.

High efficiency heat pumps have been installed in the past three years to replace several aging furnaces on campus, in our highest energy-using buildings, that have reduced energy consumption by 50% for those buildings.

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Here are recent examples of high efficiency changes on campus:

1. From 2017 through 2018, the college replaced the heating and hot water boilers in Gladfelter, home to our cafeteria (the biggest energy-consuming building on campus) and Cannon lecture hall with 98% efficient Lochinvar brand systems. This reduced the natural gas use in the building by 40% during the first year of operation.
2. The old heating boiler in our largest dorm - Sunderland- was also replaced with the same high-efficiency Lochinvar systems and has reduced energy usage by 50%.
3. A new, 120-ton high-efficiency air conditioning chiller was installed for the science/lab buildings Morse and Witherspoon, significantly reducing energy costs for both buildings.
4. New electronic controls were installed for the HVAC pneumatic systems in the Music Wing and Morse classrooms for better temperature control and to reduce energy costs.
5.In 2017, the College drilled thirteen new thermal wells for the Jensen academic classroom building's HVAC system, bringing the total number of wells to twenty-six.
6. In 2017, we also drilled two more wells for the Laursen office building to bring its total number to four. The new wells brought both buildings up to full capacity as designed by the engineer.
7. A solar unit was installed to power a natural gas meter on campus.
8. An off-grid solar mobile trailer was built to power Homecoming lights/activities at the College field.
9. The College pool is offline and is being renovated to be very energy efficient.
10. Plans are set to retrofit the Music Building and the Theatre for energy efficiency by cladding both buildings with exterior, insulating envelopes.

Staff at Facilities Management provided extensive information for this report.The Climate Action Plan is attached to demonstrate campus-wide engagement in energy saving initiatives. This plan will be updated in 2020. This report has been modified based on the STARS Review Team input to reflect accurate degree days data.