A nearly $18 million energy-efficiency upgrade to Reading public facilities is expected to save the city money in the long run.
City Council recently approved the nearly $18 million contract with Schneider Electric Buildings Americas Inc., Horsham Township, Montgomery County, for light emitting diode, or LED, lighting and other energy-saving upgrades to City Hall, the public works building, and city parks, playgrounds sports fields and recreation centers.
The initiative, known as known as the Energy Efficiency and Energy Transition Project, includes the installation of solar-capturing canopies on the two city office buildings and Cedar Street parking lot; heating and air conditioning upgrades to the field houses at Pendora, Keffer, Schlegel and Baer parks; and solar lighting on Skyline Drive.
Bundling the work will result in cost savings for the city, said Bethany Ayers Fisher, city sustainability manager.
Funding will come through a combination of a $12 million loan and $6 million in American Rescue Plan Act COVID-19 relief funds.
Much of that expenditure will be recouped, Ayers Fisher said.
Under the state’s Guaranteed Energy Savings Act, she said, the total project cost will be reduced to $4 million after accounting for energy savings, federal and utility rebates, and federal grant support.
The city expects to save nearly $9 million over the next 20 years through the improvements, which support Reading’s goal of transitioning to renewable energy by 2050, she said.
“We are taking the investment and putting money into the project, but we’re going to be receiving the savings back to us,” Ayers Fisher said. “So that way it’s almost like we’re paying ourselves back.”
Despite the projected savings, council members Melissa Ventura and Wesley Butler voted against the initiative.
Both said they support energy-savings measures but are concerned about taking on $12 million in debt just a little more than two years after the city exited Act 47 state financial oversight in July 2022.
Ventura also said she is concerned by the administration’s decision to use $6 million in ARPA funds for the project without first bringing it to council.
“I can’t sit here and support $6 million going into this when for the past three years, since we received the ARPA funds, I’ve had constituents with businesses, all our nonprofit organizations, asking about the ARPA funds,” she said.
Ventura said she would have preferred offering another round of ARPA grants to small businesses and nonprofits.
Part of the intent behind the federal ARPA grant, Councilman O. Christopher Miller said, is to give the city opportunities to invest in the future of the community.
“This is an excellent example,” he said of the energy project. “And it’s also a way for the city to show the citizens about how important it is to be sustainable.”
But Miller also said he understood Ventura and Butler’s hesitation.
“As councilors, our fiduciary duty is to make sure that our constituents understand why the dollars are being spent,” he said. “And obviously in this case, the number is fairly large.”
Councilman Jaime Baez said he was swayed to support the project after hearing residents William Vitale and Ruby Mora speak in favor of it during the public comment period.
Vitale, a retired architect and chair of the city’s Environmental Advisory Commission’s communication committee, said the commission supports the project.
A major focus of his preretirement work, he said, was green building and sustainability.
“I’ve been thinking about things like this for decades,” he said. “How do we get the city of Reading, both in the public and private sector, off its reliance on carbon emitting fossil fuels.”
The emissions are resulting in climate change and other harms, including health issues, he said.
Mora said she agreed with Vitale.
“I feel like it would benefit the city and just everybody within the city in its entirety,” she said.
Vitale said the scale of the project is impressive.
The 12,003 solar panels proposed for City Hall and Cedar Street will produce 5.5 megawatts, 99% of the electricity consumed by the building, Vitale said. The array of 3,140 panels proposed for the public works building will produce 1.2 megawatts, close to double what is needed to operate the building, he said, noting the excess will go into the grid for distribution elsewhere.
“So I think this project, the scale of it, the impact that it will have, the process that it will kick in motion is really, really important,” Vitale said.
Source: Berkshire mont