Did you know that University Facilities has an

  Energy Conservation Program?

The Rutgers Energy Conservation Program was established in 1993 and is closely monitored by the Utility Operations division of Facilities Operations and Services. The University reinvests Utility rebates and verified electrical savings into further conservation projects and for Utility deferred maintenance projects.

The State of New Jersey has established energy saving rebate programs over the past several years. The earlier programs were the Demand Side Management (DSM) which included lighting and building components replaced with high energy efficient products. This program required meters to be installed to measure the energy saved. This program has been replaced with a new program called Smart Start. The Smart Start program gives a rebate for specific new and replacement high energy efficient products. The rebate is given after the products are installed and verified. The DSM program was very costly to administer and maintain vs. the smart start program.

Demand Side Management (DSM)

The University completed 5 phases under the DSM programs with an investment over $7 million. This program was mainly lighting retrofits in New Brunswick campus buildings. In addition, variable frequency drives were installed in our central plants and selected large buildings. Free cooling units were also installed in selected locations on all New Brunswick/Piscataway campuses.

     Listed below is a summary of the projects that make-up the DSM Program Phases l – V:

Phase l:     is comprised of lighting retrofits in eleven buildings totaling 730,000 Square feet of space.

Phase ll:    is comprised of lighting projects in four buildings totaling 700,000 Square feet of space.

Phase lll:   is comprised of lighting projects in eight buildings totaling 650,000 Square feet of space.

Phase lV:   is comprised mainly of free cooling units installed in our central plants. There is one building that a lighting retrofit was performed totaling 83,000 Square feet of space.

Phase V:    is a combination of lighting retrofits, Variable Frequency Drives and large motor replacements. These improvements were performed at selected locations in fifteen buildings, totaling 850,000 Square feet of space.

The above project encompasses a total of 45 buildings representing 3,013,000 square feet of Space on the 5 New Brunswick/Piscataway campuses. The yearly energy savings for these projects average 14 million kWh.

Smart Start

Numerous projects have been completed under the smart start program. Lighting, VFD’s, motors, light sensors and even large absorber chillers have been installed with the help of the smart start rebate program.  We have saved millions of kWh with these installations, however unlike the DSM program, we were not required to measure the savings for each project.