When Cranston Public Schools Energy Manager Karen Verrengia was hired in 2006, she set out to make the district more efficient. Fast-forward three years and Cranston has seen a cost avoidance of over $2 million.

Joel Zisserson, director of Plant Operations and Transportation for Cranston, believes the success of the program starts with Verrengia.

“Her role is to educate the custodial staff, the teachers and the principals so that they are aware of what they should be doing in the schools such as turning off computers and lights when they’re not being used,” Zisserson said.

Verrengia also meets with plumbers, electricians and HVAC technicians to examine each school to identify areas of potential energy improvements. When she came to Cranston, energy guidelines became mandated and a cost tracking software was put into place.

Shying away from the spotlight, Verrengia is emphatic that it is more than that. It’s the behind the scenes action and the collaborative effort that makes the energy program tick. Albert Fullerton is part of that effort. As the senior custodian at Stone Hill Elementary School, he turns every other light off in the still-bright hallways.

Fullerton also shuts off the domestic hot water tank when it’s not needed and keeps classroom ventilators off at the appropriate times as advised by Verrengia. By 2:30 p.m. each day, the exhaust fans are switched to off.

Verrengia applauds Fullerton’s efforts. Stone Hill is one of four school buildings in the district that has earned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s prestigious ENERGY STAR for superior energy efficiency. The award signifies the building’s energy performance is in the top 25 percent of facilities nationwide.

The other schools currently receiving this award are Daniel D. Waterman, Chester Barrows and Edgewood Highland Elementary Schools. They will be presented with plaques at the November school committee meeting.

Achieving this status is no small task, considering that of Cranston’s 31 school buildings, several are over 80 years old and host antiquated heating, lighting and ventilation equipment. In all there is 1,755,082 square feet to manage.

“It’s a team effort and really a challenge, given that we have old equipment, old boilers and old thermostats,” Zisserson said.

Verrengia has identified this equipment – and how to efficiently operate it – in floor plans made for custodial staff to help them with their energy task. She also puts yellow stickers on switches that correspond to staff’s daily shutoff lists.

At Park View Middle School, foreman Gordon Kirconnell emphasizes that consistency is important in maintaining an energy efficient building. Park View has some of the oldest equipment in the district, utilizing two different types of heat, depending on where in the building you are. There is a domestic hot water tank in the boiler room that holds approximately 10,000 gallons of water. There is also a boiler to heat the swimming pool year-round. Most of the building utilizes oil and is steam heated, with the G wing using electric heat. Neither is particularly energy efficient, so Kirconnell has his work cut out for him.

“This building has been able to save money because of the people part of the program,” Verrengia says of the middle school.

Since 2006, Park View alone has seen a cost avoidance of $134,580, or 18.54 percent.

That savings is equal to taking 80 cars off the road for one year, growing 11,452 trees for 10 years and avoiding the release of 448 metric tons of CO2 into the air.

“We really try to keep up with the daily maintenance of the HVAC equipment, the belts and filters,” Kirconnell said. “Everything we do is the same as what a smaller school would do, but on a larger scale.”

Centralizing things like coffee pots and microwaves into smaller areas despite the school’s size has been a major part of that.

“We shut off our exhaust fans nightly and I try to shut down the boilers when I can, otherwise they run and run and run. Big boilers equal big expenditures,” he added.

Most of the building’s lighting has been replaced with more efficient lighting and classroom lights have motion sensors to turn them off when not in use.

Kirconnell has also seen a difference in student interest in keeping the school eco-friendly, partly because of the National Education Energy Development program (NEED), under the direction of Joanne Spaziano. NEED students learn about different types of energy and how to be energy efficient.

“Energy efficiency extends beyond recycling. We use green cleaners in our buildings now,” said Kirconnell. “We have receptacles in the lunchrooms to recycle juice cans. We shut down our freezers and coolers over the school vacations and consolidate so that we don’t have so many freezers and coolers running.”

He credits Verrengia’s cooperation as a key component in making the energy partnership work.

“It’s nice to have support at a higher level,” he said.

Cranston High School West has the largest area to maintain, housing five buildings total. According to Verrengia, Foreman Joe Boutin, “runs the building like a fine tooth comb.”

In addition to cooling down the building’s steamy entranceway, Boutin has replaced windows and piping and has unused equipment turned off whenever possible.

“Natural light is good,” he said.

He is one of the participants in the Building Operator Certification Course taking place in Cranston over the next few months.

Boutin’s boiler room equipment at West is more updated than some of his district colleagues, and he has been able to adjust heating temperatures according to district guidelines by setting the buildings’ HVAC Energy Management System. Assistant Principal Lynne Burke has endless confidence in Boutin and his team.

“It’s a shocking thing when you see how few guys there are on a campus this big. They go above and beyond their call of duty, fixing windows, replacing locks,” she said. “Every nook and cranny, every space is labor intensive. The buildings are used at night and on the weekends and this all falls on them.”

West has seen an energy cost avoidance of $401,603, or 29.38 percent.

Verrengia is always on the lookout for areas to save. Many buildings have new lighting and take advantage of National Grid’s small business program that offers an incentive for lighting retrofits, which Zisserson says is a good start.

“Unfortunately we don’t have the money in the budget to put in all new energy saving equipment in every school,” he said. “We peck away at things, we all work together, and eventually we’ll get there.”

As a district, Cranston has seen an energy reduction impact equivalent to keeping 1,158 cars off the road for a year, saving 6,454 metric tons of CO2 from being released into the air and growing 165,092 tree seedlings for 10 years.

“Everyone’s small effort adds up to one big difference,” Verrengia said.

For more information on the Energy Management Program in Cranston Public Schools, visit the Web site at www.cpsed.net/energy.