Is Your Church an Energy Star?

Even if you’re skeptical about climate change, you should be still interested in moving dollars from air conditioning to outreach.  And if you’re put off by the tendency of some environmental efforts toward moralization, you may find the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star program worth a look.

EPA started the Energy Star program in 1992 to reduce energy consumption and power plant emissions.  It has since evolved into a far-reaching effort to provide information and guidance to anyone interested in reducing energy use and costs.

The Agency began by offering guidelines for homes and businesses and guidelines for ministry organizations - Energy Star for Congregations – appeared in 2007.  The guides compare actual energy use to conventional usage for each building type and designate those that beat do well (75 on a scale of 1-100) as Energy Stars.

Just this summer, the Agency released a free web-based tool – Performance Ratings for Houses of Worship - to help church leaders “assess the energy performance of their buildings; make more informed budgetary, investment and management decisions; and help Energy Star participants publicize their energy efficiency achievements.”  The tool is based on several specific characteristics shown to drive energy use:

• Number of seats in the worship area
• Number of days the building is open for use
• Weekly operating hours
• Number of personal computers
• Presence of a commercial food preparation area
• Number of commercial refrigerators, and
• Weather

Jerry Lawson, national manager of Energy Star’s Small Business and Congregations Network pointed out in an article for Worship Facilitites Magazine that the new Ratings apply to buildings whose primary function is as a place of worship – churches, temples, mosques, synagogues, meetinghouses – and not to other buildings that may be associated with a religious organization, such as living quarters, schools, homes, or buildings used primarily for other community activities. (It also applies only to worship facilities that have 4,000 permanent seats or less.)  Characteristics and usage unique to worship spaces are accounted for by comparing them only to other such facilities.

To help you get started, the Agency offers benchmarking data, webinars and other information at www.energystar.gov and at (888) 782-7937.