Release Date:
05/12/2010
YouBlue is the Dakota County Technical College News Blog
Excerpt: Thanks to a grant from Minnesota Schools Cutting Carbon, DCTC is switching from 40-year-old, high-pressure sodium lamps in the college’s parking lots to new, Beta LED lights.
“The LED lights use one third the power,” reported Don Deutsch, an electrician in the college’s Operations department. Deutsch provided technical assistance to Trudi Greaves, the assistant director of the DCTC Foundation, when she wrote the original grant application. “The sodium lamps are 450 watts as opposed to the LEDs, which are only 144 watts.”
Students in the DCTC Electrical Lineworker program volunteered their expertise to swap out the lights. Steve Addy, an instructor in the program, brought out a number of bucket trucks plus a crack crew of future lineworkers to do the job. “We can all do our part to conserve electricity and decrease the college’s carbon footprint,” Addy said. “Sustainability is the name of the game.”
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The Clean Energy Resource Teams are a joint program of the University of Minnesota Regional
Sustainable Development Partnerships, the Southwest Regional Development Commission, the Minnesota
Project, Minnesota Department of Commerce, and the Green Institute. The CERTs program brings together
team members from diverse backgrounds including farmers, utility representatives, state and federal
government staff, educators and academics, small business owners, members of non-profit and environmental
groups as well as individuals interested in energy issues. Together they work to identify and implement
community-scale energy efficiency and renewable energy projects across the state. Major funding is
provided by Minnesota Department of Commerce, The Blandin Foundation, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency,
University of Minnesota Institute for Renewable Energy and the Environment, University of Minnesota
Regional Sustainable Development Partnerships, and U.S. Department of Energy.
