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EPA Celebrates the Mercer County School District in Kentucky as an ENERGY STAR Leader

Release Date: 02/24/2012
Contact Information: Dawn Harris-Young, (404) 562-8421, [email protected]

ATLANTA – The Mercer County School District located in Harrodsburg, Kentucky was recognized by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as Energy Star Leader that improved the energy efficiency of their building portfolios by 20 percent or more. Nationally, EPA’s Energy Star program helped 90 leading organizations achieve President Obama’s goal by providing them with a proven energy management strategy, which includes a focus on ongoing performance measurement and whole-building improvement.

ENERGY STAR Leaders must meet one of two energy efficiency improvement milestones. The first milestone requires a 10 percent improvement in energy performance across their entire building portfolio. Subsequent recognition is given for each 10 percent improvement thereafter. The second milestone, known as “top performer,” requires that buildings in an organization’s portfolio, on average, perform in the top 25 percent when compared to similar buildings nationwide. To be eligible for ENERGY STAR Leaders recognition, organizations are required to track and submit energy performance data for all buildings and fuel sources through EPA’s ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager tool.

ENERGY STAR Leaders have cumulatively saved more than $150 million on utility bills and prevented greenhouse gas emissions equal to the electricity used by nearly 95,000 homes. The complete list of ENERGY STAR Leaders includes more than 200 organizations and includes school districts, national retailers, commercial real estate companies, healthcare systems, supermarket operators and hotel managers that have achieved energy efficiency improvements across more than 11,400 buildings covering nearly 730 million square feet in the United States.

With help from EPA’s Energy Star program, thousands of businesses and organizations are improving the energy efficiency of the places where we work, play and learn and are saving billions of dollars and preventing millions of tons of greenhouse gas emissions from entering the atmosphere each year.

Complete list of Energy Star Leaders as of December 31, 2011: http://www.energystar.gov/ia/business/leaders/Leaders_full_list_2011.pdf?2758-99c7

More about Energy Star Leaders: http://www.energystar.gov/leaders