WEST HARTFORD, Conn. — Legrand, North and Central America recently announced that the final winners of Energy Marathon 3.0 are Legrand’s Fort Mill, South Carolina, and Minnetonka, Minnesota locations. Previously held in 2014 and 2016, Energy Marathon is a company-wide competition designed to encourage employee teams to save as much energy as possible through ready-to-implement technology and process changes, and by reshaping energy usage behaviors.
Based on the length of a marathon, the competition took place over a 26.2-day period in October. The 2019 Energy Marathon was Legrand’s largest ever with 26 competing locations across the United States. This past years’ event also introduced a new format in which similar sites were paired off to compete as a single team.
Winners have been declared within three building-class categories (warehouse, manufacturing, and office). In the warehouse category, the Fort Mill, South Carolina and Minnetonka, Minnesota sites sustained a remarkable 47.3% reduction in energy usage. This percentage is the highest reduction seen in the history of Legrand’s Energy Marathon initiative. Fort Mill focused on optimizing their HVAC system, diligently turning off their industrial fans and automating their lighting systems. The Minnetonka facility adopted a variety of energy savings best practices including turning off unused lights and installing programmable thermostats in the warehouse.
In the manufacturing category Denver, Colorado and St. Louis, Missouri were the winning sites with a 26.7% energy reduction and Syracuse, New York and Eden Prairie, Minnesota were recognized in the office category with a reduction of 19.7%
As Energy Marathon seeks to encourage long-term sustainable changes in energy use, Legrand continued to track meter readings for the top three teams past the end of the event until December 20th, with the ultimate Champion announced at the end of January. In total, from the event’s kickoff to the final reading, the company saved over 970,000 kWh, $97,000, and avoided emitting 531 metric tons of carbon.
“The Energy Marathon continues to demonstrate its potential to change energy behavior, identify new practices to reduce consumption, and spark employee energy awareness and enthusiasm through a friendly competition, stated Susan Rochford, Vice President, Energy Efficiency, Sustainability and Public Policy, Legrand North and Central America. “Not only do we achieve substantial results in carbon and cost reduction, but we forge new connections across our rapidly expanding network which provides a lasting benefit to the organization.”
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