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Infrared technology played an important part in dealing with school energy problems in Berlin, New Hampshire. It provided the school board and administration with information and data which proved useful in prioritizing the expenditure of limited capital improvement funds. It enabled the board and administration to diagnose the extent of building heat loss problems and compare the heating oil component of our energy problems with independently diagnosed electricity and gasoline components. Since seventy (70) percent of school energy expenditures are on heating oil, infrared assumed the role of a very important diagnostic tool. The Berlin (NH) Public Schools manifest problems faced by public schools in many areas of the country; declining enrollments, inflation, and taxpayer resistance to increasing public expenditures. With eight buildings to heat and light (six schools, a bus garage, and a vocational forestry building), rapidly escalating energy prices threatened to raise total school energy costs as a percentage of total budget from less than seven (7) percent to almost twenty (20) percent, unless consumption reductions were effected. There were minimal obstacles to infrared implementation in Berlin, for a number of reasons. First, the cost was not prohibitive. Second, there was little community understanding of the technology along with an historic separation of specific, relatively low cost school expenditures from close public scrutiny. Finally, the school board and administration realized that, if the energy problem was to be adequately dealt with, a clear understanding of the problem was necessary. The best way for that understanding to be developed was through professional examination of our buildings using the most modern techniques. At this juncture, after only one winter, it is clear that the payback period for Berlin's investment in infrared technology has been surpassed.
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