SLC sweats outdated heating

by Fariha Chowdhury '11

Thursday November 29, 2007

Students have often complained that as soon as the weather becomes colder, their dorm rooms become intolerably hot. At Sarah Lawrence, electric fans purchased for use in the beginning of the year and then at the very end, are used instead around the year to mercifully cool a room, even in the bitter cold of winter. Such massive energy consumption would make Al Gore weep! Is SLC hastening the coming apocalypse from the rising of global water levels with its energy consumption?

Why is the school using (and paying for) so much unnecessary heat? The fact of the matter is, you are different, and so are our heating systems. “There are a variety of heating systems on campus,” says Director of Facilities, Maureen Gallagher. “In Hill House there are two big boilers, while in the Old Dorms run off one big boiler, and heat comes up to these four buildings.”

“I would say Andrew’s Court, one to eight, which runs on electric coils, are the most wasteful,” says Vice President of Operations, Micheal Rengers. “The Old Dorms, such as Gilbert, Titsworth, MacCracken, and Westlands are less sophisticated. They were built in the 1920s, when they still used coal for heating.” The heating even varies from room to room in certain dorms. “In Hill House, if you’re living in the G-Line apartments, which is in the interior, you’re going to feel the heat much more than those who live in the “exterior” apartments,” said Rengers. “In Garrison, it’s always one side is cold and the other side is hot.”

The reason one room might seem too hot is because the steam from a boiler is being pushed through pipes consecutively throughout an entire building. The first room heated is very warmly in order to maintain the set standard for room temperature, 68 to 72 degrees, in the last room to be heated. The archaic nature of the heating system is attributed to the institution’s lacking endowment funds for facility repairs and, according to Rengers, is just the nature of heating in “all of
metropolitan New York and nowhere else.”

According to Operations and Facilities, it costs approximately $390,000 to pay for gas, $340,000 to pay for oil and $240,000 to pay for the electric heat, which is forced hot air that heats buildings such as Heimbold and the science building. Two HVAC (Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning) personnel maintain the heating and air conditioning systems. “They go around and check out if the boilers are turned on, watch the vents, and see if they are all clean,” said Gallagher. “They also handle emergencies where everybody is involved. We have a very small staff
with these specific skill sets to handle multiple jobs. And then we have the maintenance supervisor who answers calls about heating issues.”

The boilers run on a timer that turns the heat on and off according to the temperature outside. The Operations and Facilities office is due to release a memo detailing the ways students can take more control over the temperature in their rooms, emphasizing how critical it is to inform Operations of any problems in their rooms regarding the heating so they can take action as quickly as possible.

“The school is trying to make dorm rooms more comfortable during the winter through insulating the pipes, so a student is able to turn off their radiator without being too cold,” says Gallagher.

“And, we want students to tell us of heating complaints—if they’re too cold, or too hot. We don’t want them bringing electric heaters into the rooms that haven’t been approved or issued by us, because this could be incredibly unsafe. If we’re told of the problem, we can issue our own approved heater for the room.” Added Rengers, “A company is coming in shortly to help us improve on the comfort for students and save on the energy consumption.”

Students can send in heat complaints to cfasjobs@slc.edu.