Every church that I know seeks to live and demonstrate effective stewardship in their management of the physical plant and financial resources entrusted to its leaders. What follows is a short story of what our church leadership has done to clarify, address and manage our heating and lighting costs.
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About four years ago, two of our church leaders agreed to assess and react to the, then, state of how efficiently we were heating our building. Our goal was to contain our future heating, and in time, our lighting costs for the next ten years and beyond. One of these leaders had taken a job with the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, and at that time, offered to travel to Clearfield and complete a detailed walk-through of our facilities in order that we determine our course of action.
As the energy audit was completed, and with the help of a local plumber, our Trustees and Session was approached with the recommendation to invest $7,000 to insulate our steam and condensate lines under our church facilities. In addition, and with the leadership of our buildings and grounds committee chairman, we then moved to replace multiple steam traps that had aged and were near failure. Along with this effort, our Trustees and Pastor proceeded to insulate the area above our sanctuary to tighten the building envelope.
At this point, our DEP energy expert and congregation member offered to complete a follow up analysis of our energy usage to confirm what we felt would be significant reductions in energy use and costs. The results of this analysis were breathtaking! Our heating costs fell by nearly 45%, and our future cost containment strategy was moving forward. Our next priority was to apply for a First Energy retrofit grant to seek funding assistance for the replacement of our lighting tubes and ballasts in our Westminster Hall; the Christian education facility of our church. First Energy has since confirmed approval of our funding request, and we are moving to replace our ‘old lighting’ with new, high efficiency tubes and electronic ballasts.
First Energy’s valued funding grant will assist our church in lowering its total electric bill by over one-third, and will more than offset the impending increase in electric rates scheduled for January of 2011. Several men of the church will remove the old fixtures and retrofit the new fixtures in the next month. In addition, as we address the replacement of the roof on our educational building, we hope to pursue and receive grant funding for a future renewable energy – solar in particular, project to further assist our congregation in controlling future operating costs.
We project that looking ahead over the next decade; these combined efforts will save our membership a projected total of over $125,000.
In conclusion, our congregation understands that by utilizing the talents of our membership, we have demonstrated effective stewardship with the financial resources that have been entrusted to us, and have contributed to our church’s mission in the years to come!
William I. Armstrong, RSBA and Vice-President of Trustees
Presbyterian Church, Clearfield, PA 16830
