Address: 300 South 6th Street, Minneapolis, MN

Overview:

Hennepin County and The Retrofit Companies worked together on a lighting retrofit of the 29-story Hennepin County Government Center. In this project, overhead lamps in offices and public spaces were replaced with new, energy-efficient lamps. To minimize interruption to daily county business, the contractor worked overnight shifts to replace 21,658 lamps over six weeks.

Hennepin County — realizing the importance of energy-saving measures — dedicated more than $1 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding to cover the cost of this and other projects to improve efficient lighting in county buildings. Xcel Energy encouraged the re-lamping effort by providing a rebate of $1 per lamp.

Benefits:

• The project has a cost payback of less than two years.
• The lighting retrofit will save the county 475,000 kilowatt-hours of energy.
• The reduced energy use results in a cost savings of $55,000 annually.
• The project retained 2.37 full-time employees with The Retrofit Companies.

Partners:

• Hennepin County
• Lighting Matters, Inc.
• The Retrofit Companies
• Xcel Energy