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Hoover hires Alabama Power for $9.4 million in energy upgrades

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Photo by Jon Anderson

The Hoover City Council has agreed to hire Alabama Power to do $9.4 million worth of upgrades to the city’s energy and utility systems.

However, the upgrades won’t cost the city any money, Hoover Mayor Frank Brocato said. “This is not costing us a dime,” Brocato said.

Instead, the city should recoup all the costs associated with the upgrades by reducing the amount of electricity, natural gas and water used by the city, said Joey Beck, an engineer with Alabama Power.

The city actually should save about $113,000 a year in utility costs over and above the savings needed to pay for the upgrades, Beck said.

And that savings is guaranteed by state law, Hoover City Administrator Allan Rice said. If the city doesn’t save as much money as Alabama Power projects the city will, the company will have to pay that amount to the city, Rice said.

Alabama Power over the past year conducted an audit of the city’s energy systems and usage patterns to help determine the savings that could be achieved by upgrading to more energy-efficient equipment and technology.

The upgrades to be performed in 2021 include installation of new high-efficiency water chillers, a heat recovery chiller and mechanical system and control upgrades at buildings such as Hoover City Hall, the Hoover Public Safety Center, Hoover Public Library, Hoover Recreation Center, Hoover Senior Center, Hoover Metropolitan Stadium, Hoover Police Operations Center, Riverchase sewer plant, Aldridge Gardens office and three fire stations.

The project also includes lighting upgrades at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium, Shades Mountain Park, the city sports fields at Spain Park and tennis courts near Simmons Middle School, as well as the replacement and retrofitting of 10,628 light fixtures at multiple buildings across the city, Beck said.

Additionally, Alabama Power will replace water fixtures with more efficient technology at 14 city facilities, eliminate a less efficient water system at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium and capture sewer credits from irrigation of the field at the stadium, Beck said.

The annualized cost of the upgrades over 20 years is $871,314, but the city will save $984,032 a year in utility costs and forego $3.45 million worth of capital projects, Beck said.

Those savings include reducing utilities by an estimated 8.25 million kilowatt-hours of electricity, 90,890 therms of natural gas, 4.5 million gallons of water and 6,315 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalents each year, Beck said.

Rice thanked City Council President John Lyda for bringing this energy savings idea to the table, saying it had not been on the administration’s radar beforehand.

Brocato echoed that sentiment and said the energy upgrades are overdue. So much of the city’s infrastructure is aging and needs to be replaced with more efficient technology that didn’t exist when the buildings were initially built, he said.

“We’re 50 years old now, and over time, things go bad,” he added.

Many of these energy systems are very expensive to replace but very important to city operations, Brocato said. It will be great to be able to replace them without incurring any cost or having to borrow any money, he said.

People may not notice some of the upgrades, but others could be more evident, such as the new field lights at city ballparks. The lights at Shades Mountain Park are well over 40 years old and have been going out in the middle of games, Brocato said.

Also, the new lighting system at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium will include the ability to have colored lights much like those being added at some college and NFL stadiums across the country, Beck said.

In other business Monday, the Hoover City Council:

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