The South Lewis High School/Middle School campus is located in the Tug Hill Plateau region of upstate New York. This area is famous for lake effect snowfalls measured in feet rather than inches. There are many winter days when air temperatures drop well below 0° F as the snow piles up. Not surprisingly, heating is by far the largest energy requirement at this school.
The two school buildings and bus garage make up about 207,000 sq. ft. They were originally heated by a pair of oil-fired, cast-iron boilers. These boilers kept the facility warm but in the process consumed about 85,000 gallons of No. 2 fuel during a typical winter. The price of that oil has fluctuated significantly over the last several years and at times was more than $4 per gallon.