In addressing energy efficiency issues in county owned buildings DeKalb County will be applying for a Clean Tennessee Energy grant.

Existing fluorescent lights in the DeKalb County Courthouse and the Jail will be replaced and light-emitting diode (LED) lights if the county is approved for the grant through the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation.

During Monday night’s meeting, the county commission adopted a resolution making application for the $37,856 grant through the Upper Cumberland Development District. The county’s matching obligation would be 50% or $18,928.

Environmentally, the reduction in energy usage from this project is expected to result in lowered power plant emissions and overall a lower carbon footprint. Fiscally, the reduction in energy usage will mean lower monthly bills to the county, allowing the savings to be reinvested in other ways.

A TVA Energy walk through lighting audit was conducted recently at the courthouse and jail as a service of Smithville Electric System to provide an energy usage analysis and the potential impact of LED lighting retrofits. Many of the lights throughout the courthouse are currently comprised of T-8, T-12, T-8 U tubes, and linear fluorescent bulbs that use a great deal of electricity. The jail also has a combination of obsolete T-8 and T-12 bulbs. LED lights, while more expensive, last much longer, consume less electricity and will make the buildings more energy efficient.

The total material cost for lighting retrofits at the courthouse would be $7,833 resulting in a simple payback of 1.3 years (76% rate of return) representing a 19.5% reduction in the annual energy cost at the courthouse. Similarly, material costs at the jail would be $5,767 resulting in a simple payback of 1.1 years (92.2% rate of return) reducing energy costs by 20.8% at the jail.

The estimated reduction in electric energy consumption from the project is 94,881 kilowatt hours per year, equating to a financial savings of $11,275 per year. That’s the equivalent of the annual greenhouse gas emissions from a passenger vehicle driven 159,809 miles or over 2.1 tons of waste recycled instead of being placed in a landfill.

Officials stress that these are estimates only and that the final cost, savings and payback will depend on a number of other factors including installation costs, disposal costs, etc.

Also during the meeting a resolution was passed to request unclaimed balance of accounts remitted to the state treasure under the Unclaimed Property Act in the amount of $25,545.77. Unclaimed property is remitted to the state by the county’s clerk and master and must remain for 18 months. The mentioned balance was remitted on April 15, 2015, and Mayor Stribling added that some unclaimed property may have been collected from that amount. The county will not know the actual total being returned until the payment is received from the state treasurer.