[53428] in Hotline Meeting
ENERGY ALERT for LABS WITH FUME HOODS
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Peter Cooper)
Mon Jan 15 11:57:45 2001
Message-ID: <82F0D564C5ADD31180EF00508B55645112C851@PLANT.MIT.EDU>
From: Peter Cooper <PLCooper@PLANT.MIT.EDU>
To: "'plant-notify@mit.edu'" <plant-notify@mit.edu>
Cc: "'rtdavis@mit.edu'" <rtdavis@mit.edu>
Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2001 11:56:44 -0500
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain
ENERGY ALERT for LABS WITH FUME HOODS
January 2001 Please distribute immediately.
Natural gas, the main fuel for MIT heat and electricity, is 3 TIMES more
expensive this month than last year's average.
The continuous air flow into fume hoods necessary for personnel safety, is
one reason that lab buildings are the biggest energy consumers on campus.
1000 cubic feet per minute (cfm) is drawn into a typical hood with the sash
fully open and 250 cfm when nearly closed. 54,000 BTU/hr is required to
warm 1000 cfm of 20F outside air to 70F. So up to 40,500 BTU/hr can be
saved by closing a hood sash. With this month's cost of gas at
$11.50/million BTU and accounting for boiler efficiency and distribution
losses, this flow reduction saves $.58/hr, $7.00 over a 12 hour night, $266
over a month of nights and weekends and $266,000 in fuel cost over the
approximately 1000 hoods at MIT.
Actually all hoods are not left fully open and some buildings recapture some
of this wasted heat with heat recovery systems as air exits at the roof.
Also as winter goes on it will get warmer and gas prices will decline, but
significant money can be saved by researchers' conscientious operation of
their fume hoods.
Researchers are urged to save energy in any and every way:
* Close fume hood sashes whenever possible to minimize heated air flow
into the hood and out the roof.
* Return your room thermostat to auto if you've had it in manual
over-ride
during late night work.
* Shut off lights, computers and other equipment when you leave.
* Use revolving doors to reduce warm air loss from lobby entrances.
* Call Carl at ENCON (3-6266) or utilities@mit.edu with your
suggestions to save energy, or call FIXIT (3-4948) and select emergency
option if you see a potential for freeze-up like an open window or door.
