Hyde Park hears $12.95 million energy-performance contract proposal including rooftop and ground solar; board to consider contract May 8

Honeywell and Energia presented a $12,950,000 energy performance contract (EPC) proposal to the Hyde Park Central School District Board of Education on April 22, outlining lighting, controls, HVAC upgrades and both roof-mounted and ground‑mounted solar that the firms say would be paid from guaranteed energy savings, utility rebates, state building aid and federal incentives.

The proposal, presented by Justin Benoit, director of project delivery for Energia, and a Honeywell lead identified as Terry, would generate roughly $586,000 a year in utility savings, tap nearly $3 million in utility and other incentives, and — Honeywell said — produce more than $5 million in cumulative positive cash flow over a 15‑year financing term once building aid is applied. Honeywell also said New York State would pay about 58% of most eligible project costs as building aid for an EPC of this type.

The project scope described by Honeywell includes a districtwide LED conversion, completion and expansion of the district’s building automation system, replacement of older unit ventilators in several classrooms, and two solar installations: a roof system sized to serve the high school and a roughly 1.3-megawatt ground‑mount array proposed at the Netherwood site. Honeywell also said it had won a separate $6,000,000 NYSERDA grant to electrify Ralph R. Smith Elementary School — replacing oil and propane systems with electric heat‑pump equipment — and that work would be incorporated as a funded addition to the EPC package.

“Central Hudson…