Powering the Future – Energy Efficiency in Public Schools
As public schools across the country grapple with budget constraints, aging infrastructure, and the growing urgency of environmental responsibility, energy efficiency has emerged as a powerful lever for change. At Facilitron University 4, the session “Powering the Future: Energy Efficiency in Public Schools” brought together sustainability leaders from two of the largest school districts in the country to explore what’s working, what’s scalable, and what’s next.
With insights from Miami-Dade County Public Schools and Orange County Public Schools (OCPS), the panel made one thing clear: energy efficiency isn’t just about savings—it’s about student health, operational equity, and long-term resilience.
Rethinking the Energy Equation
In Florida, where school air conditioning systems run nearly year-round, energy bills are not just high—they’re the second-largest expense after staff salaries. That reality is driving districts like Miami-Dade to explore alternative approaches, including thermal ice storage chillers and net-zero campus design.
“We had 67 days above 90 degrees Fahrenheit,” said Karly Pulido, Sustainability Officer for Miami-Dade County Public Schools. “Overall, utilities are the second largest expenditure for a school district after salaries of staff.”
One of the most promising innovations, Pulido explained, is Miami-Dade’s investment in thermal ice storage—a system that creates ice at night when energy is cheaper and uses it to cool buildings during the day. Though the upfront cost is high, the district expects a 10–12 year payback period, with additional benefits like reduced maintenance and load-balancing for the grid.
Technology That Pays Off
For OCPS, the challenge is even more complex. With over 1,000 portable classrooms spread across the district, building-wide automation has often left these temporary structures behind. Now, that’s changing.
“We’re expecting about a 500 kWh per day per portable savings,” said Jennifer Fowler, Senior Director of Environmental Compliance and Sustainability at OCPS. “We’re going to look at possibly close to a million dollars in energy and cost savings to the district. But we’re in the pilot stage.”
Jennifer and her colleague, Jodi Dittell, are leading efforts to install smart thermostats in portables, linking them to OCPS’s central Building Automation System (BAS). These systems not only allow real-time control and monitoring—they also integrate directly with event management platforms like Facilitron.
“They don’t get AC if they don’t put a reservation in,” Fowler explained. “It’s completely changed how people engage with the system.”
This simple but effective measure—tying HVAC to actual occupancy—has helped the district reduce waste and improve planning across 160 campuses.
Protecting Air Quality While Saving Energy
But energy efficiency can’t come at the cost of indoor air quality (IAQ). For OCPS, the two go hand-in-hand.
“We do not use consultants. We do all of our assessments,” said Dittell. “Our work orders for IAQ come through Facilitron.”
With internal systems and trained staff, OCPS can track and address issues in real time—before they turn into larger problems. Fowler emphasized the importance of balance.
“If you squeeze that energy conservation down too much, now you’re gonna impact your indoor air quality… you may have high humidity… Now you have mold growth.”
OCPS conducts full summer walkthroughs of every building, making proactive maintenance part of their efficiency strategy. As Dittell noted, the goal is to fix the problem in July—not scramble a week before school starts.
Behavior, Culture, and Strategic Scheduling
Efficiency isn’t only about new equipment—it’s about educating users and adjusting behavior.
“Getting them to shift and really scheduling into the right locations… you’re saving energy because you’re not running the entire campus for two small events,” Fowler said.
By using tools that allow for smarter scheduling—like clustering events in the same chiller zone—OCPS has avoided unnecessary full-building HVAC use and helped staff think more strategically about where and how spaces are used.
For Miami-Dade, where many buildings are still on outdated systems, that kind of change takes time.
“We have facilities that aren’t even connected to a building automation system,” Pulido said. “And while we would love to take advantage of automation, we try our best to.”
Still, with a 5-year modernization plan in place and targeted pilot programs underway, the district is steadily moving toward broader integration.
Creative Funding and Student Engagement
One standout theme from the panel was the creative funding strategies being used to support energy initiatives.
OCPS has built a Green Schools Fund using rebates and incentives. Miami-Dade established an Energy Reserve Fund, seeded by projected savings and grants.
“We’re anticipating a savings of $1.2 million annually that we can feed into the Energy Reserve Fund to keep these programs going,” Pulido said.
And energy conservation isn’t just an operations project—it’s also a student engagement strategy. Pulido described their “How Low Can You Go?” challenge, which turns energy savings into a competition among schools, complete with rewards like Miami Heat tickets and on-court experiences.
“Some years we’ve even gotten a chance to meet some of the basketball players after the game,” she added.
Powering What Comes Next
The session ended with a reminder that energy efficiency is not just a budgetary imperative—it’s about creating high-performing schools and future-ready districts.
“This is about making sure every student and staff member has a healthy, high-performing place to learn,” said Fowler. “And making sure we can keep delivering that for decades to come.”