With an aim toward maximizing facility performance, and thereby students’ potential, the ASHRAE High Performance K-12 School Facilities conference will present an integrated approach to complying with codes and standards while achieving a cost-effective, high-performance solution to K-12 facility design, construction, and operation. It will be held March 1-2 in Atlanta.
The goal of the conference is to bring together administrators, design professionals, policy makers, and other stakeholders to learn about the many ways to improve these facilities on operational, fiscal, engineering, and administrative levels. Energy efficiency will be focused on as a prime vehicle for such improvements.
“Sixteen percent of school districts’ controllable costs are spent on energy,” says Ben Leppard, a member of the conference steering committee and track chair. “By focusing on energy efficiency and high performance goals, a school’s energy bills can be lowered, saving millions of dollars each year that can be redirected into facilities, teachers’ salaries, computers, and textbooks. [Additionally,] improved indoor air quality, acoustically designed indoor environments, and high-performance lighting systems have the potential to increase student productivity.”
Experts in the fields of acoustics, lighting, ventilation, system controls, energy efficiency, and operation and maintenance will be present at the conference, leading sessions that focus on three key areas of high-performance school facilities: ventilation systems, building systems control, and acoustics.
For more information or to register for the conference, visit www.ashrae.org/highperformanceschools.