Never Judge a Book By Its Cover

The second speaker to present to our class was Maria Redburn, the Library Manager at the City of Bedford Library. It was the classes first field trip so we were able to see the sustainable initiatives first hand. This was a very inspiring story of a woman who was an every day librarian and had been selected by the city to create or renovate a facility that would be cost efficient and Green. Having no prior knowledge of sustainability Maria did was she does best and began the daunting process of researching exactly what options were available to her. As she stated during our visit, "most people don't realize that before Google there were librarians! We are the original Google."

She began her venture into sustainability when she found an existing Food Lion grocery store that could be converted into a functioning library. This space would need to be re-purposed and have some green initiatives implemented if it was going to work but Maria was hopeful. The building would provide a much larger library that what she previously ran and she could save the city the substantial amount of investment of not having to actually build a new library from the ground up.

Maria then went to work researching and implementing some new sustainability initiatives such as low walled working spaces with timed LED high efficiency lighting which turn off after 10 minutes of inactivity, a white reflective roof that deflects the heat from the hot Texas sun to naturally keep the building cooler, a more efficient and effective automatic RFID sorting system, solar panels to reduce electricity usage, water efficient fixtures, natural lighting panels and an impressive external Geothermal Heat Pump System that is buried underground right outside of the facility to more efficiently heat and cool the building.

On top of Maria's charge to implement these new sustainability initiatives she was under pressure from the city to keep costs as low as possible due to a strained city budget. She had found from her research that many grants and incentives were available from state and federal programs that could assist in covering some of the costs of these efforts. Due to Maria's efforts, the city has received a $175,000 incentive from Oncor from the Take a Load Off Texas Solar PV program to offset the costs of their solar panels as well as a $1,998,000 grant from the State Energy Conservation Office for the installation of the a grid connected solar panel system at the new library. It is estimated that the solar panels will produce approximately 345,000 kWh of energy annually. At the entrance of the library there is an interactive machine that displays all of the energy savings and sustainability specs for the building. There is also an online version available on the City of Bedford's website.

Due to Maria's amazing efforts the Bedford library is a success and the city has been able to see enough cost savings to hire more staff to assist those visiting the library. The library's success, and Maria's personal success, has been an inspiration to me. She started with no knowledge of the world of sustainable building and was able to dive in head first and really make a lasting difference for the city of Bedford and it's residents. I commend her for the unwavering fortitude it took to go forward with this endeavor and all the heart she has put into her love of education and community assistance. I definitely suggest you visit the library first hand and meet Maria. It is a beautiful building and a state-of-the art facility with plenty of private study rooms, a homey lounge area, computer labs, and an extremely fast and private computerized self-checkout area. As an added bonus you may get to meet Maria, who's kindness and tenacity is refreshing. If you do, I'm sure she wouldn't mind giving you a tour of the facility (time permitting). I highly recommend it. 

For more photos visit my photobook page here.