Warren County Public Schools are being recognized nationally for teaching that it takes more than just yellow and blue to be green.

Officials from the district will be in Washington, D.C., on Thursday to receive one of the most prestigious awards in the nation for energy savings after beating out 15 other nominations, including the Los Angeles Community College District’s project to build nine campuses with a renewable energy plan.

The Alliance to Save Energy awarded the district the Andromeda Award, which is given to organizations, companies, learning institutions as well as state and government programs with less than $10 million annual revenue for their efforts to promote energy efficiency, according to the organization.

The award emphasizes the district’s efforts to avoid more than $4 million in energy costs over the last five years in addition to constructing four buildings that have received Energy Star certification.

The award emphasizes the district’s groundbreaking efforts to develop the first net zero energy school building in the country that is projected to save an estimated $233,744 annually.

Richardsville Elementary School, currently taking form on Richardsville Road, was designed to use 75 percent less energy than most school buildings. With 40,000 square feet of solar panels, the school will produce more clean energy than the building will consume in standard energy. The clean energy will be sold back to TVA, so the school will essentially pay its own bills.

The building’s architect, Kenny Stanfield, with Sherman Carter and Barnhart, said the firm nominated Warren County for the efforts made not only in building design, but to reduce energy consumption districtwide since December 2003, when its energy management policy was implemented.

While most schools operate on an energy level of about 73 KBTUs per square foot, Plano Elementary School was designed and constructed about three years ago to use 28 KBTUs per square foot.

Mark Ryles, director of the Division of Facilities Management for the Kentucky Department of Education, said the building spawned the idea to save even more energy – and the idea for the net zero school was born.

After excruciating tweaking, including a unique kitchen designed with the aid of Duke Energy Green Kitchen strategies, Richardsville Elementary is designed to operate on 18 KBTUs per square foot.

Stanfield said while the solar panels are unique and attention-getting, it’s the building’s reduction in energy consumption that is really impressive. He said the techniques being used at that school are receiving national attention and are being replicated everywhere.

“The solar panels were the easy part, reducing energy was the hard part,” Stanfield said. “If a school that is not energy efficient wanted to spend millions of dollars to put solar panels on the building, it could approach the cost of the building itself … what made Warren County successful is it kept reducing energy and it’s those things people can learn from and take away from this.”

The $11.6 million school building, which will include natural daylight features and an LCD monitor in the lobby to show students the real-time energy savings produced by the solar panels, has already drawn national attention in several architectural and building magazines. But the Andromeda Award marks the first energy savings award for the efforts in designing a net zero school – one which hasn’t even been completed yet.

On Thursday, Stanfield and Interim Superintendent Tim Murley will join Warren County Energy Manager Jay Wilson and the district’s Director of Facilities Charles Rector and Construction Inspector Robert Rogers in attending the black-tie Evening With the Stars of Energy Efficiency award ceremony in Washington, D.C.

“We’re known nationally for energy savings but it seems like we’re not known here,” Murley joked when he announced the award at the school board meeting Monday.

Ryles said it’s a “huge deal” for the district to receive the prestigious national recognition, and that the efforts made in Warren County have shown that even greater things can be attained.

“This is very prestigious for Warren County and at some point, for the commonwealth at large to have a school district winning at this high of a level,” Ryles said. “It’s a huge accomplishment, if not, someone else would have done it first. It’s a culmination of good things and people with the right vision.”