NC, Engineers Install AC Valves to Lessen Mold in School

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Engineers to tackle mold at East Burke

Middle school hopes to buy time while district saves for new AC

JEN ARONOFF

_jaronoff@..._ (mailto:jaronoff@...)

Eighteen moldy years at East Burke Middle School will soon come to an end,

officials hope, thanks to a solution designed by a Charlotte engineering firm.

That fix will only minimize, not solve, the mold issues, engineers and

officials say. But it will give the district time to plan and save for a new

air

conditioning system -- the cause of the problem.

The system is too large for the building and uses piping that makes it

difficult to control humidity. As a result, it cools outside air too quickly

and

doesn't process it long enough to remove moisture.

This has led to relative humidity readings as high as 85 percent at the

school, far above the 30 percent to 50 percent recommended by the EPA. Excess

moisture causes mold.

United Engineering Group of Charlotte will design a series of controls and

valves to cool the air longer and wring out moisture. In addition, the

engineers are designing new water chillers to replace existing ones that were

not

sufficiently cooling air.

The project should cost about $108,000, according to engineers' estimates.

Work should begin by late winter and is expected to take about three months,

Associate Superintendent Randall Brackett said. Contractors will be able to

do most of the work when kids are in the building.

The district is also planning for similar work at Liberty Middle, a

basically identical building that opened two years after East Burke, Brackett

said.

Work there will begin in late winter of 2007, he said.

Totally replacing the air conditioning system is the ideal, most effective

solution to the mold problems, according to United Engineering. But it's also

the most expensive -- $1.5 million -- and would take six to nine months of

construction.

That would be difficult to accomplish with the school occupied, engineers

and district officials said.

And vacating enough classrooms to allow large sections of pipe to be

installed poses a logistical problem, especially because East Burke is the

district's most crowded middle school, with 800 to 900 students, they said.

" We wanted to have an immediate impact at the lowest cost, " Brackett said.

The valve replacement will buy time -- five to 10 years, the engineers

estimated -- before the entire system needs to be replaced. That makes it a

good

investment, if the district uses that time to plan for a new system, the

report said. That's exactly what it aims to do, Brackett said.

East Burke has been plagued by mold since it opened in 1987, particularly

during the summer months. Over the years, maintenance workers have tried every

solution they could think of, but the mold kept coming back, officials said.

The district was prompted to take more dramatic action beginning this

summer, after Felicia Hildebran, the parent of an East Burke student, contacted

local media to draw attention to the problem.

This week, Hildebran said she was encouraged by the district officials'

actions so far and hoped they would make the best use of taxpayers' money.

" I just hope they make the right decision, " she said. " Because if you just

put a Band-Aid on something and not fix it, it's going to come back. "