Energy Conservation Made Easy at Hyde Park

Hyde Park’s Board of Directors and committee members have been researching many different alternatives for energy conservation to cut Hyde Park’s utility costs.  YOU have an impact on the environment with what you use and what you waste:  the water you use to bath, wash, cook, etc and the sewer charges to get rid of that water; the gas you use in your car; the cost to produce the electricity and natural gas you use at home and at work.  This article provides you some simple ideas to cut Hyde Park’s utility costs and to be friendlier to the environment.

1)  Calculate your impact – go to www.epa.gov/climate to see what your personal impact is on the production of greenhouse gas emissions.

2)  Replace your old appliances – refrigerator, microwave, TV, VCR, etc – with Energy Star appliances that are significantly more energy efficient than anything produced even five years ago.  Go to www.energystar.gov to find out about these products.

3)  Stop leaks in your faucets and toilets.  A faucet that drips 60 drops per minute will add up to 190 gallons of wasted water in one month.  If you have a bad seal on your toilet flap your volume of wasted water is considerably higher.  Our engineering staff will fix these leaks for you if you cannot do it yourself.  Take action now.  Visit www.h2ouse.org to find out more about your impact on the environment based on your water usage and what more you can do to cut water consumption.

4)  Use the recycling bins in the trash chutes.  Separate waste from paper, plastics, and glass and put your recyclable items in their appropriate box in the trash chute rooms.  Do NOT dispose of hazardous waste by dumping it down your drains or throwing it in the garbage chute; please speak with Mr. Ramon Wye, our Chief Engineer, about the best way to dispose of those kinds of items.  Together we can ensure nothing is wasted at Hyde Park.  Visit www.earth911.org to find out more about recycling everything – seriously, everything!  Estimates state that if recycling went up in the United States from 30 to 60 percent, the nation would cut the use of approximately 315 million barrels of oil each year.

5)  Replace your incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) or even with LEDs.  CFL bulbs, those “twisty” light bulbs, will immediately contribute to a major cut in our electric bill at Hyde Park.  LEDs are more expensive than CFLs, but they last even longer and use markedly less electricity than even a CFL.  The Board would like to replace every incandescent bulb in the building with CFLs.  The Board is also researching the best way to replace all our old fluorescent bulbs and ballasts with modern, energy efficient tubes and ballasts.  We’d like to place motion-sensor switches on some lighting systems to cut energy consumption even further.  If you know of a location that should be placed on a motion sensor system, please let us know.

6)  When you leave for the day turn down, or turn off, your heat or A/C.  When you are not home there is little need for perfect temperature comfort.  Let your house warm up a bit this summer; it will cool off very quickly when you come home and turn your A/C back on.  The same applies in the winter with the heat. 

7)  Seal the edges of your windows and doors with a gap-filler.  Removing heat and A/C loss through the seams around your doors and windows quickly improves the quality of your unit’s comfort and cuts energy use.  See any hardware store for the right supplies.

8)  Consider replacing your old convectors with modern versions.  New models are quieter and heat and cool much more effectively.  Were every unit owner to replace his/her convectors with modern systems, Hyde Park would see a big reduction in total electric use because the  new fans and coils circulate warm and cool air much more efficiently.

Hyde Park Actions

The Board plans to have an energy consultant review our entire infrastructure to assess energy use and the most cost-effective ways to improve our building.  We plan to replace our two 30-year-old chillers with energy-efficient ones that use significantly less electricity, don’t use the old-style Freon, and will run at variable speeds based on load requirements thus cutting our peak electric use during the hottest days of summer.  But, your cooperation in raising your thermostats when you are not at home will cut those electric costs even more.

We will also replace all of our defective plumbing, thereby cutting down on leaks.  New hot water pipes will be wrapped with thermal material to conserve heat, cutting energy consumption in the boiler systems.  The façade repairs will cut down on some of the heat and A/C losses through the expansion joints.  We will continue to look at window and door replacement, and are likely to replace the original windows and doors in around five years with modern, energy efficient, double-pane windows and doors.

Our water temperature setting will be set to around 130 degrees Fahrenheit during the day and 120 degrees at night to limit wasteful extra heating on our hot water systems.  Most large buildings experience an $8,000.00/year savings by making this simple adjustment.  Hyde Park will have this same savings.

Our Chief Engineer has been doggedly repairing or replacing systems that have reached their lifespan. As we purchase new systems, we will ensure they are the most energy efficient on the market, based on cost effectiveness.

Please do your part to cut your use of our utilities.  Without your contribution, the entire Association suffers.  It is such an easy thing to do, and it is the right thing to.