Community Corner
Penndale joins the Battle of the Buildings
CONTACT:
John Collier
Penndale Middle School
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400 Penn St
Lansdale, PA 19446
Find out what's happening in Montgomeryville-Lansdalewith free, real-time updates from Patch.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 20, 2013
Penndale Middle School to Compete in the
2013 ENERGY STAR National Building Competition
(Lansdale, PA)
Penndale Middle School, managed by the Enact Club, will be competing among more than 3,200 participants in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA's) 2013 ENERGY STAR National Building Competition: Battle of the Buildings. The competition serves as a platform to help organizations improve the energy efficiency of commercial buildings, and protect the environment. In the spirit of popular weight-loss competitions, Penndale will battle it out against more than 3,200 other participants across the country to work off our energy waste through improvements in energy efficiency, with help from EPA’s ENERGY STAR program.
"Penndale is honored to be a part of EPA’s ENERGY STAR National Building Competition,” said John Collier, the Enact Club’s advisor. "This year, we’re taking our energy management program up a notch to compete with thousands of others in this national competition, and we look forward to watching our energy use and greenhouse gas emissions drop, and our cost savings rise.”
The teams in the 2013 ENERGY STAR National Building Competition represent more than 2 5different types of commercial buildings - such as retail stores, schools, hotels, and hospitals - and hail from all 50 states, two U.S. territories, and the District of Columbia. The competitors range from a General Motors warehouse in Ypsilanti, Michigan, to the St. Louis Cardinals’ Busch Stadium in St. Louis, Missouri, to the main campus of the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. EPA will maintain a website devoted to the competition, www.energystar.gov/BattleOfTheBuildings, featuring a list of competitors and their “weigh-in” results, a map of competitor locations, a live Twitter feed where competitors will post updates on their progress, and a user-generated Flickr photo stream where competitors will upload pictures highlighting their energy-saving efforts. “Thousands of buildings across the country are going on energy diets with help from EPA and ENERGY STAR,” said Jean Lupinacci, Director of EPA’s ENERGY STAR Commercial Buildings Program. “Organizations like those competing in this year’s National Building Competition are taking a bold step by putting themselves in the spotlight as they compete to protect the environment and save as much energy as possible.”
Competitors will measure and track their monthly energy consumption using EPA's ENERGY STAR online tracking tool, Portfolio Manager; make improvements to their building or space’s energy performance; and share their progress. Among the more than 3,200 competitors this year, the building or tenant space that demonstrates the greatest percentage-based reduction in energy use intensity will be recognized as the winner in April 2014!
The Enact Club is taking the following steps to reduce energy use Penndale:
· Teaching with the lights out on sunny days
· Testing lighted areas and removing bulbs that are unnecessary
· Promoting energy savings both within the school and at home
According to EPA, energy use in commercial buildings accounts for nearly 20 percent of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and energy use at a cost of more than $100 billion per year. On average, 30% of the energy used in commercial buildings is wasted. Thousands of businesses and organizations work with EPA’s ENERGY STAR program and are saving billions of dollars and preventing millions of tons of greenhouse gas emissions from entering our atmosphere each year. Watch the battle unfold at www.energystar.gov/BattleOfTheBuildings
Learn more about The Enact Club here: www.weebly.com/penndalegs
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