Green School Failure

December 11, 2012 – 3:59 pm

Surprise!

(USA Today) Thompson Elementary ranked 205th out of 239 Houston schools in a report last year that showed each school’s energy cost per student. Walnut Bend Elementary ranked 155th. A third “green” school, built in 2010, ranked 46th in the report, which a local utility did for the district to find ways of cutting energy costs.

Poor equipment maintenance plagued the schools built in 2007, a problem that districtwide improvements are now addressing, said Gavin Dillingham, the district’s energy manager until August.

“People have the mistaken impression that once buildings are LEED-certified, they’re always going to run energy-efficiently,” Dillingham said. “They don’t.”

The problems in Houston illustrate the little-discussed uncertainty of “green schools,” which promise huge energy savings and rising student performance, but do not always deliver, despite their extra cost.

Not all “green” schools fail to promise what they deliver, however, their costs, such as in construction and maintenance, tend to exceed savings. I’m all for doing what’s right for the environment, but this gets absurd.

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This entry was written by William Teach and posted on at 3:59 pm and filed under Energy, Environment. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.
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14 Responses to “Green School Failure”

  1. Watcher of Weasels » Watcher’s Council Nominations – It’s Beginning To Look A lot Like Christmas Edition says:
    December 12, 2012 at 3:38 am

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    December 12, 2012 at 9:02 am

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  4. john says:
    December 12, 2012 at 11:48 am

    Teach the article you cited says that the added cost of building a Green school is 2 or 3% I think that should have been mentioned by you, care to update ?

  5. Watcher’s Council Nominations Are Up! | Independent Sentinel says:
    December 12, 2012 at 12:07 pm

    […] The Pirate’s Cove – Green School Failure […]

  6. Gumball_Brains says:
    December 12, 2012 at 12:13 pm

    Yeah Teach… you have to point out things to people who can’t read for themselves, or do their own research, or are even capable of asking pertinent questions. Shame on you Teach for not violating DMCA by posting the whole linked article.

    promise huge energy savings and rising student performance

    What the BLEEEP does green construction have to do with student “performance”????!?!?

  7. Watcher’s Council Nominations – It’s Beginning To Look A lot Like Christmas Edition | askmarion says:
    December 12, 2012 at 12:43 pm

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  8. Trevor Loudon's New Zeal Blog » Watcher’s Council Nominations – It’s Beginning To Look A lot Like Christmas Edition says:
    December 12, 2012 at 1:17 pm

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  9. Watcher’s Council: A Lot Like Christmas Edition « TinaTrent.com says:
    December 12, 2012 at 4:57 pm

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  10. William Teach says:
    December 12, 2012 at 7:03 pm

    Well, what with the “green” toilets being super smelly and the pipes blowing out from urine, kids spend more time on class. Or something.

  11. Gumball_Brains says:
    December 12, 2012 at 7:34 pm

    And sadly, having a school fall on top of your kid, or have the toilets exploding, is not an acceptable reason to have your child moved to another school or homeschooled.

  12. Bookworm Room » Watcher’s Council submissions for December 13, 2012 says:
    December 13, 2012 at 7:23 pm

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  14. The Council Has Spoken!!~ This Week’s Watcher’s Council Results – 12.14.12 | askmarion says:
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