Energy Awareness Project for Secondary Schools

In a bid to promote sustainable energy management in high schools across Jamaica, students and teachers are to be trained as energy auditors under an energy awareness project.

The project, “Promoting Energy Awareness in Jamaican Secondary Schools” is a collaborative effort among the Jamaica Fulbright Association (JBA), the Ministry of Education, the Scientific Research Council and the Jamaica Public Service.

As part of the project’s activities, a competition is being staged, which will see high schools across the country competing against each other to demonstrate sustainable energy management practices.

Speaking at the launch of the competition at the University of the West Indies Mona campus on Wednesday, September 5, Education Minister, Rev. Ronald Thwaites, endorsed the competition, noting it will help realise significant savings for the public education sector.

He noted that the cost of electricity used by Government entities in 2012 was estimated at $13.5 billion, noting that the education sector accounts for seven per cent of Jamaica’s total energy consumption.

“The monthly utility bill for the education sector, for public schools is $250 million every month. Now can you imagine what we could do to improve education if we had some of that? The Jamaican population needs to adopt a culture of energy conservation and what better place to begin that culture shift than in the schools,” he said.

Students and teachers will also be trained to use data logger machines to help monitor energy and electricity usage at their schools.

The first round of the competition will run from September to December 2013.  A total of 15 schools will be selected to move on to the second round, which will run from January to March 2014. The third round will include only the five schools that save the most energy. These schools will be invited to present their findings at an award ceremony in May 2014.