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News
Scott Monson's Energy-Saving Tips Published in Living Church Magazine
January 10, 2007
Scott Monson's Energy-Saving Tips
Published in The Living Church
The Rev. Scott Monson of Christ Church, Austin, was asked by the national Episcopal magazine, The Living Church, to contribute to an article by Michael O’Loughlin on controlling church energy costs, published in the January 7, 2007, issue. Four of Scott's tips were published in a sidebar to the article, and are reprinted below.
Click here to read the entire article (without the sidebar), which also quotes Scott Monson.
Steps to Savings
The Rev. Scott Monson shares four energy- and money-saving tips that have worked at Christ Church, Austin, Minnesota:
Turn down the water heater. We have one large water heater for our entire facility. We keep it on the lowest setting except when we need high-temperature water for wadhing dished at large receptions and dinners. We also installed a five-gallon, under-counter water heater in our guild hall kitchenette that provides hot water for coffee hour clean-up, smaller receptions, and weekday needs. This has saved us a lot of money.
Shut off cooking gas when not needed. Our commercial ranges have 12 pilot lights, each of which burns constantly. By shutting off the gas, we save a lot ot natural gas that otherwice went to waste. It only takes our sexton a few minutes to turn on the gas and light the pilot lights when we need the ranges. We have an electric range in the guild hall kitchenette that can handle food preparation for all but the largest dinners and receptions.
Turn down the heat in the nave. In the cold weather, most people wear long-sleeved garments, sweaters, and/or jackets to church anyway. We keep our nave at 62° seven days a week. An energy audit (see below) revealed that it costs less to heat it at a constant temperature than to try to bring it way up for Sunday morning. Body heat raises the temperature during worship. Before the first service actually begins, the room temperature has usually already risen several degrees. We keep the chancel even cooler. Choir and acolyte robes and clerical vestments keep us quite comfortable.
Get an energy audit from your local utility provider. Our local utility was happy to do a no-cost energy audit of our facility. That audit resulted in our enacting most of these cost-saving measures.
Energy Stars, joint program of the Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency, offers more energy-saving tips and resources for congregations at its website: www.energystar.gov/congregations.
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