Burlington Is Technical Adviser To Customers

Holly Mussatti, director of the physical plant for Champlain College, relies on the staff of Burlington Electric 

Burlington Electric Department helped Champlain College develop the financial justification to install and later expand a thermal energy storage system. Photo courtesy BED.

Department as an extension of her own small staff.

“We’re a small college and we don’t have a lot of in-house experience,” she said.

BED helped Champlain College develop the financial justification to install, and later expand, a thermal energy storage system that cools campus buildings. Air conditioning vendors might not look upon Vermont as a prime market, but when temperatures climb in the summer, Vermonters want to be comfortable too. The growth of air conditioning, coupled with a reduction in winter heating load, is transforming Burlington Electric from a winter-peaking to a summer-peaking utility, said Matt Lillis, director of commercial services for BED.

Mussatti appreciates the intense technical assistance BED staff has given the college on its construction projects. “They worked right with us to make sure we had the capacity we needed and it was ready in a timely manner,” she said. “I’m not necessarily certain we would have gotten that from a private company.” Champlain College installed its central cooling system in 1998 and expanded it a few years later. The college purchases off-peak power at lower rates to freeze water that is used in the daytime to cool buildings. The system is unusual at a site as small as the college.

BED routinely provides financial assistance and technical expertise for its customers. “We work with all customers, large and small,” said Lillis.  “We have efficiency programs that range from leasing compact fluorescent lamps to providing incentives for large industrial processes.”

Recently, Burlington Electric has helped customer attain certification in the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Green Building Rating System. LEED is a voluntary, consensus-based national standard for developing high-performance, environmentally sustainable buildings.   A LEED-certified building will be energy-efficient and the whole package benefits the community, environment, building occupants and owners, Lillis said.

“We’ve been educating our customers about energy efficiency and sustainable buildings for years,” he said.  “We’re glad to see the trend continuing to develop.”