Green team
The Greening of Harcourt Church
The sub-committee or “Green Team” was formed in June 2009, following the successful installation of the solar array on the gymnasium roof the Green Team was assimilated into the Property committee in 2011.
The Congregation has professed the desire “to live with respect in creation”. Our respect is expressed by the Green Initiatives at our Church facilities and are as follow ;
- To reduce the energy used in our facilities such as electricity for lighting and natural gas for heating.
- To reduce the water consumption e.g., in toilets and in garden watering.
- To examine the building envelope to determine if insulation needs to be added and how air leakage can be reduced.
- To examine the efficiency of our boilers and present use of electrical heating units with a view to reduce energy consumption and heating cost.
- All these things are being done in order to reduce our carbon footprint.
This listing is not complete and will no doubt be added to in the future.
The following items have either been completed or are being looked into ;
- Listing of Energy Consumption over the last seven years for Electricity, Gas and Water in both quantity and dollars in order that we can monitor our usage,
- A municipal water usage specialist was invited to view our fixtures and more importantly to check if there was any water leakage by fixtures or by leakage of pipes underground and the test was negative.
- Harcourt took part in the Hydro Energy Blitz and subsequently changed a number of light fixtures, ballasts and fluorescent tubes for new ones with a significant higher efficiency. The financial payback period is approximately four years.