Case Studies
Lake Tahoe Unified School District
The Challenge
In 1998, e•three joined forces with the Lake Tahoe Unified School District in 1998 to take a look at ways of saving energy within the school district. Lake Tahoe Unified School District is the primary Kindergarten through 12th grade school district in South Lake Tahoe, California that has an enrollment of approximately 5,700 students. The school district is comprised of five elementary schools, one middle school, one high school campus, the district offices and the bus barn. After careful consideration, this First Phase Project was comprised of the installation of energy efficient lighting at all sites. The objective of this Energy Conservation Measure was to provide savings in energy and associated energy costs as well as reducing lamp and ballast replacement costs and associated labor. The energy efficient lighting retrofit at all sites within the district was developed to meet the following objectives:
- Improve lighting effectiveness
- Reduce electrical load and save energy
- Reduce maintenance costs and simplify maintenance
- Maximize consistency of fixtures and lighting components
The scope of work agreed to consisted of the installation of electronic ballasts and T8 lamps, the tandem wiring of fixtures to reduce quantity of ballasts used, all exit signs were retrofitted to or replaced with LED units, all new exit signs were equipped with battery backup, the replacement of old fixtures with new fixtures where a cost effective retrofit strategy was not available and the standardization of lamp inventories.
Impact
The Lake Tahoe Unified School District was very pleased with the finished project including disposal of all existing lamps and ballasts, replacement of missing, cracked and/or yellowed lenses and diffusers, standardization of lamp inventory, maintained or improved light levels, energy and associated dollar savings and most important of all, a turn-key project.
