Okehampton College picks up UK energy efficiency prize

Okehampton College has scooped a national prize for energy efficiency as part of the EU's U4Energy competition.

Keith Webber, Community Energy Manager of Okehampton College said, "It's great to receive further recognition for our work to increase energy efficiency in our school.

"We are now planning to add wind power and biomass heating to further reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.  Okehampton is well its way to becoming an energy efficiency showcase, demonstrating all kinds of technologies and measures."

Two weekends ago, Okehampton College hosted 800 people riding across Britain to raise money for the Paralympics.  The school's NVQ catering students provided all the meals, with a large proportion of the electricity coming from its solar PV.

Mr Webber added, "The food was high energy but the school was not."

The school has already been recognised for its efforts to save energy when it won the Ashden Award 2010.

The U4Energy competition was created by the European Commission in 2010 to encourage European-wide competition on energy education. Schools from all over Europe compete for prizes across a range of categories. From the pool of national winners, three European winners and three runners-up will be unveiled at a ceremony in Brussels on 26 November.