Energy 'champs' lead the way for conservation and savings

By Joanne Whitfield

Lulu Elks has it. Rose Canela and Sandra Ashby have it. And you have it, too.

Everyone has the power to make a difference in saving energy and protecting the environment. That's the idea behind a new federal energy conservation program called "You Have the Power" that the USPS, in partnership with the Department of Energy and several other federal agencies, launched nationwide this past August.

"Although we have been a leader in energy conservation for years," says Charlie Bravo, "we agree this program will be a primary strategy for achieving a 20 percent saving on energy costs by the year 2005." A back to basics energy conservation promotion, "You Have the Power" asks employees to do whatever they can to conserve energy, at work and at home.

The program doesn't call for drastic lifestyle changes. Just ask Sandra Ashby, Lulu Elks, and Rose Canela, who were all nominated by the Postal Service to be "Energy Champions" for their important work in using energy wisely at their facilities. Much of what they do to conserve energy is simple, easy and a matter of common sense.

Lulu Ellks

Elks, a clerk at the Willow Glen Station in San Jose and a nine-year postal veteran, was cited as an Energy Champion for her recycling efforts. She modestly explains that everyone at her facility participates in recycling and that "everyone is an Energy Champion. We recycle everything here at our station," she says. "Newspapers, cardboard, mixed paper, and aluminum cans. Tossing an aluminum can into the trash now and then might not seem important, but when you realize that by recycling just one of those aluminum cans, you save enough energy to power your computer for half a day, you realize just how important it is for everyone to recycle."

Saundra Ashby

Sandra Ashby, manager, Maintenance Operations in Merrifield, VA, and Merrifield P&DC Energy Compliance coordinator, has always looked for challenges and opportunities to improve herself and her work. She came to the Postal Service 16 years ago as a letter sorting machine (LSM) operator, but when she saw the opportunities that were becoming available for women in Maintenance, in 1985 she switched careers. She began as a Mail Processing equipment mechanic, then became an electronic technician after getting her associate degree in electronic technology, and in 1992 she was promoted to manager. "I'm glad I took the chance," she says. "I thought Maintenance would offer me a new challenge, and that's just what happened."

Ashby was chosen as an Energy Champion for replacing outmoded and inefficient electric motors, water pumps and air-conditioning with more efficient equipment. "Not only was our air-conditioning not energy efficient," she explains, "but it also wasn't doing its job. We got complaints all the time about certain parts of the building being too hot, while others were too cool. By replacing the system, we saved energy and also helped make employees more comfortable."

Ashby is also involved in recycling at the P&DC. "We are recycling 90 tons of materials a month," she explains. "And that's stuff that all used to go into the garbage that we had to pay to have hauled away, so not only are we saving energy by recycling, we are also saving money. Over a two-year period it cost us $250,000 to dispose of stuff that we are now being paid to recycle. We have reduced our garbage pickups from five a week to two a week, and we have made more than $26,000 in revenue from our recycling efforts."

Rose Canela

The Postal Service's third nominee for Energy Champion, Rose Canela, Hispanic Program specialist in San Jose, has made "turning off" her personal challenge. She diligently turns off lights, coffee pots, computers, copiers, and other equipment, both at home and at work. "If it has an off button, I use it," she says.

She points out that shutting off just one two-lamp florescent fixture for 10 hours a day saves $230 in one year. "That demonstrates just how important it is for each one of us to help save energy. And it shows that we do all have the power to make a difference."

These three women demonstrate that if everyone in the Postal Service made an effort to save energy, the dividends would be tremendous. The Postal Service's energy bill currently is $375 million. "By reducing consumption as little as 3 percent, we could save more than $15 million a year," explains Bravo.

All three Energy Champions talk about future generations and how they will be affected by what we all do now to conserve energy. As Canela says, "I'm a grandmother, and I want my grandchildren to have a good life, and I can help them do that by taking good care of 'their' energy now."

For Ashby, the necessity to save energy, recycle, and protect the environment came into focus at a meeting she attended where an energy expert asked what the Great Wall of China and a very large garbage dump in New York had in common. When no one knew the answer, the expert said: "They can both be seen from outer space."

She said that startling example made her understand how important everyone's contribution is. "If we don't all do our part to recycle and save energy," she says, "we won't have room on this planet for anything but garbage."

Says Bravo, "Like Elks, Canela, and Ashby, every employee has the power to turn off that light, fix that leaky faucet, insulate our water heaters, weather-strip our windows and doors, recycle cans and paper, join a carpool or do whatever we can to save energy."

"You might not think what one person does matters," adds Elks, but each of us has the power to make a difference and we have to, for the kids and the future.

Return to