GAC09010
April 22, 2009

The Presbyterian Center wins ENERGY STAR award

Contact:
Susan Lindsey, (502) 569-5060

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The Presbyterian Center, home of the national offices of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), has been honored with an ENERGY STAR award for positive changes the center has made to conserve energy.

The federal ENERGY STAR program recognizes buildings that rate among the top 25 percent of facilities of similar use across the country for energy performance. The center was one of nine Louisville buildings to earn the award in 2008, up from five in 2007.

Joe Ferguson, PC(USA) director for building services, participated in the April 21 award ceremony in the office of Louisville Mayor Jerry Abramson. Representatives of the Kentucky Office for Energy Development and Independence, the EPA and ENERGY STAR also participated.

“Over the past 15 years, we’ve had numerous energy audits that identified where we could save costs,” said Ferguson. “Based on these audits, we made changes such as installing an energy management system, changing lighting to fluorescent where possible and putting timers on several outside lights. These and other changes helped reduce our carbon footprint. Based on a scale of one to 100 for facilities in our category, the Presbyterian Center ranked 81.”

Mayor Abramson said, “As an ENERGY STAR partner, our city has a vested interest in encouraging energy efficiency. We’re beginning to benchmark our own government buildings in an effort to better manage our energy use. But these ENERGY STAR award winners have already taken steps to become energy efficient and we are pleased to recognize their work.”

For information on the ENERGY STAR partnership, visit the Louisville Metro Government's Go Green Louisville Web page.

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) serves about 2.2 million members in mission and ministry in approximately 10,800 congregations throughout the United States and around the world.