VILSECK, Germany — Last winter, a U.S. soldier stationed at Grafenwöhr Training Area decided it would be a good idea to leave a heater running on her icy front porch while she went on leave to Puerto Rico for several weeks.
The heater was there to warm a dog that she had left tied up on the porch in freezing conditions during her break in the sun.
The case raised concerns about animal cruelty once a neighbor notified authorities. But it also highlighted the enormous waste of energy that U.S. government policy can foster among personnel living and working overseas. The soldier decided to save money on kennel fees but didn’t think twice about the hefty electricity bill that she’d have to pay for a heater running round-the-clock in the snow.
Why would she?
The government pays the energy costs of personnel stationed overseas the same way it pays for their housing. There are limits to how much the government will pay, but there is no incentive for Americans to save money on utility bills.
While Germans are keenly aware of their electricity and heating bills — to the point that their homes are noticeably cooler than those of Americans in winter — U.S. personnel simply submit their utility costs and lease agreements to the government, which reimburses them.
Greg Fobell, management program analyst division chief at U.S. Army Garrison Grafenwöhr, said the government is experimenting with giving people economic incentives to save energy at U.S. facilities, but there are no such plans at Grafenwöhr.
At a town hall meeting for the garrison at Vilseck on Wednesday, Tom Hays, Grafenwöhr director of public works, displayed a graph detailing the $32.6 million that the garrison spent on energy last year. The figure includes $12 million spent on electricity, $1.4 million on heating oil, $16.9 million on other forms of heating, $1.7 million on natural gas and $177,423 on propane.
"Help us keep that cost down," Hays appealed to a few dozen people who had showed up out of a U.S. population of close to 30,000.
The inability of the garrison to use economic incentives to get people to use less energy at home is prompting leaders to use other tools to try to cut costs.
Fobell said staff members are looking at functions on base.
"If we could get AAFES to turn these off," he said, pointing to an array of lights burning in brilliant sunlight on the outside of the post exchange.
In March, garrison commander Col. Nils "Chris" Sorenson asked, in a command message, for ideas from the community on ways to save energy.
Garrison customer service officer Melynda Weaver said ideas put forward so far include installing solar panels and waterless urinals in on-post facilities.
In fact, the garrison is already adding solar panels to new barracks and will require new urinals to be waterless from fiscal year 2010, she said.
Other ideas include reusing waste water, car pooling in government vehicles, installing sensors to turn off lights when people are not around, solar water heating, shorter hours for parking lot lighting, turning off thermal range targets when they are not in use and "jib-jab" road lighting — staggering road lights on opposite sides of streets so that only half as much energy is used.
However, Weaver added, "Turning off lights has to be balanced with force protection."
