ECONAR^® Energy Systems - Commercial Case Study
"Little Red School House" - Onamia, Minnesota

Onamia Elementary School, located in Onamia, MN is one of many buildings across the northern parts of the United States enjoying their state of the art heating and cooling system. They have gone beyond the old wood stove in the corner, beyond burning fuel oil, beyond burning propane and beyond burning natural gas. In fact, they don’t have a furnace at all. Each classroom enjoys its own heat pump, controlling and providing individual comfort, winter or summer. In addition to the benefits the system provides in heating the school, it also provides total air conditioning, available year round to all parts of the building. The schoo'ls hot water is also heated with geothermal by ECONAR’s hot water heat pumps. The school is safe of combustible fuels and pollution, has improved indoor air quality and is working with the environment. The earth loop field, providing the energy for the school, also doubles as baseball and soccer fields.

Geo$ense

The system is 350% efficient. That means for every unit of energy that goes into operating the system, it returns 3.5 units. Onamia heats, cools, dehumidifies and runs all lights at half the cost of just heating the attached high school, which uses a traditional combustible fuel system.

Physical Data

• 80,000 square feet, Built in 1992
  
• 560 Holes at a depth of 50 feet each & 11 Miles of Pipe
  
• 230 Tons Cooling Capacity - Capable to extract 1.75 million Btu’s per hour Heating
  
• Utilizes 53 ECONAR GeoSource 2000 heat pumps in a variety of sizes
  
• Architect/Engineer – TKDA, St Paul, MN
  
• Mechanical Contractor – El Jay Plumbing and Heating, Inc, St Cloud, MN
  
• Earth Loop Contractor – Bergerson Caswell, Inc, Maple Plain, MN
  

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