HALIFAX — Halifax County Schools are turning out lights and turning down the thermostats but not too low. Students have to be warm to be able to learn, but the district is doing a great job of saving money, according to Jessup Nelson, founder and president of Educon Inc.

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The district entered into a contract with Educon to audit the school’s energy use. The year, 2007 was used to gather data and to serve as the base year for comparison. Nelson said the company’s comparisons exclude the energy use by Brawley, McIver and Eastman schools in the base year, so they reflect an adequate comparison of “apples to apples.” Those three schools have since been closed.

Based on its studies, Educon helped the school implement energy saving strategies which maintained comfort levels for students and faculty.

In a presentation to the Halifax County School Board, Nelson informed board members schools have decreased consumption of propane, heating oil, water and kilowatt hours. While there have been increases in consumption of natural gas and sewer use, overall schools showed a cost avoidance/savings of $188,000 or 13 percent.

Nelson said price reductions in utility rates on natural gas, heating oil and propane helped tremendously with savings.

“The key is we don’t make people feel uncomfortable. It’s important we do our best to maintain the heating and cooling temperatures. I think in Halifax County they decided on 74 degrees for cooling and 72 degrees for heat. We do our best to maintain this, but some of the equipment is old.”

Nelson said by striving to keep people comfortable and mindful of saving energy, they are less likely to be resistant to the changes they have to make.

He said, schools showed an electricity reduction of 1,445,000 kWh alone in comparison to the base year. Add to this all the other savings and Nelson said, “This reduced carbon dioxide emissions by 2,168,000 pounds and is equivalent to eliminating 145 cars from the road or planting 296 acres of trees.

He said some of those savings were due to simple tasks like turning off all the lights and computers every night.

All those energy saving dollars recently translated into a way to make money for the school when Halifax Electric Membership Corporation recently approached the district with a proposal to buy the energy credits from the schools. That’s around $7,000 in additional funds for the district because they turned out the lights.

Nelson gave the credit to School Energy Manager Angel Whitby for the progress. Nelson said Whitby had only 10 hours per week to focus on energy saving, compared to 15 hours in other districts he works with and she did a “fantastic job.”

“We’re pleased with what she’s done,” said Nelson. He said he hopes the schools see the energy savings and sale of energy credits as incentive to fund the additional five hours per week for Whitby and to maintain the energy manager position even when the three- year program with Educon is over. Whitby was not available for comment at press time.

Nelson said the goal is to show energy reductions at 18 percent across the board and to have schools receive Energy Star Ratings. “That means they will be in the top 25 percent of all schools in terms of efficiency,” he said.

Beyond that he said his company would continue to provide workshops and suggestions on new ways to save energy. He said the main thing is to ensure the district maintains its position on saving energy, for that he said the energy manager is key.

Nelson said looking ahead he expects rate increases will continue and conservation will be even more important.

He recommended schools continue monitoring, continue to enforce compliance with guidelines, replace manual thermostats with programmable thermostats and encourage the Energy Star certification.