[Music] >>ANNOUNCER: More than eight hundred people with one mission:
Promoting a healthy environment.
We are in the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection. [music ends]
>>Kathy Cosco: According to the U.S. Census, the average American household pays just under one
hundred five dollars a month for electricity
but imagine if your utility bills ran into the thousands each month.
That's the reality for many county governments in West Virginia and the
reason why some are taking advantage of a Department of Environmental
Protection program to find ways to help ease the budget squeeze.
The DEP's Greg Adolphson has the details.
>>Darrel Ramsey: If you think about it, it's like throwing money out the window
and you wouldn't do that in with your home and were responsible for
the taxpayers money.
>>NARRATION: If you think your utility bills are high,
meet Gilmer County Commissioner Darrel Ramsey. >>RAMSEY: We're talking, in a year, it's
thirty-some thousand just for the electric for the courthouse.
You think
five days a week, eight hours a day -
that's a lot of money. >>NARRATION: It's a problem facing many West Virginia
county governments:
rising costs from older buildings that are just not energy-efficient
>>MICKEY METZ: It's unbelievable. I mean the temperature, one minute you're hot, the next
minute you're cold.
The jurors are constantly complaining about it being either too
hot or too cold. You can't get the temperature regulated.
You know, it's terrible. >>NARRATION: The courthouse is heated with steam from a boiler
and on this winter day, a team from West Virginia University's Industrial
Assessment center is checking it for heat loss.
>>BHASKARAN GOPALAKRISNAN: Get a good image of
all this piping that shows the
temprature profile.
>>NARRATION: The team uses high tech tools to check everything from electrical load to
air leaks. Inside and out, top to bottom,
it's a thorough check.
These assessments are part of the E3 Economy, Energy and the Environment
initiative that's part of the West Virginia Department of Environmental
Protection's
Sustainable West Virginia program.
It's aim:
to help local governments and participating industrial facilities reduce
energy use and costs,
minimize waste and increased overall efficiency
while reducing the facility's carbon footprint.
Currently seven counties participate in the program which provides the audits
along with recommendations for improvements at no cost to the
participants -
a price that's hard to beat.
>>RAMSEY: We only have x amount of dollars
that we work with with the tax and ah...
this is where I see that we can
maximize that tax dollar buying cutting an expense.
>>NARRATION: Participants start to come up with the cash to pay for the improvements
but many of those improvements can quickly pay for themselves.
>>BHASKARAN GOPALAKRISNAN: The cost savings would
would justify the investment because
most of these recommendations will have a return on investment
in terms of pay back - less than a year, sometimes less than
two years.
>>NARRATION: And saving green isn't just helping the budget. It's helping the planet.
>>ED CROWE: The environmental impact is important because some organizations
will have a direct impact on emissions into the atmosphere but some of the
secondary energy like electricity
goes back to a power plant and if you look at the losses to regeneration
and distribution,
There's a larger impact so for every kilowatt hour you save here
you're effectively saving the equivalent energy amount that's that's three times that.
>>BHASKARAN GOPALAKRISNAN: Energy resources are finite and costs are going to increase, they're not going to decrease
and we're got to leave a better world for our children and grandchildren.
>>NARRATION: Commissioner Ramsey says that if this pans out and they can see the savings at the courthouse,
the county has four other properties that could benefit from an energy
assessment.
He says they're moving in the right direction. >>RAMSEY: Whatever we've come out of
this with and wherever we go from
this forward,
we have the plan set - that this is what you need to do, even if we can't do it right
now and get money right now we have the plan that
our next step is let's start
saving some tax dollars here to make this happen so we'll get the windfall
back eventually. >>NARRATION: Money that instead of going out the window
will be going to serve the taxpayers of Gilmer County
In Glenville, West Virginian, I'm Greg Adolphson for Environment Matters.
>>KATHY COSCO: The program also works with the West Virginia Manufacturing Extension
Partnership
to help industrial clients with energy efficiency.
The program is funded through the West Virginia Division of Energy.
Up next: Going for the gold. A team of high school robot designers is headed to
a national competition with a little help from a DEP mentoring
program.