Location: Renton, WA
Client: Renton School District
Located in downtown Renton, WA, the historic Renton High School (RHS) was originally built in 1911. The initial building was later demolished to make room for an updated school with improvements and additional space for the increasing population of the area. Over its 105-year history the high school has been rebuilt and expanded upon many times. The latest improvements began in 2013 with a complete controls retrofit of the RHS Campus.
Controls Retrofit
ATS designed and installed a complete DDC retrofit, replacing a poorly commissioned and legacy control system with Alerton I/O controllers and global controllers along with a Niagara AX Supervisor front-end to conform with District standards. In addition to the controls retrofit, ATS also installed CO2 sensors to enable demand control ventilation strategies. According to J. Stine, Program Manager for the Renton School District’s Energy Management Office, an element that made this project such a success was the planning and gathering of input from the maintenance staff. Now RHS has a fine-tuned, commissioned and fully functional system that provides a standard for all facility improvements to come.
Savings and Energy Usage Reduction
As a result of the DDC retrofit RHS has had a dramatic drop in energy consumption and cost. Just over a three-year period, energy use has dropped 37% and cost has decreased 32%. District energy use intensity has decreased from 74.4 kBtu/sqft to 38.3 kBtu/sqft, a reduction of 49 percent.
The following chart illustrates the District’s energy usage over a three-year period compared to the school-year baseline. Substantial completion of the project was achieved during the summer of 2013.
