CSUF’s Clean, Bright Ideas Earn It a $1-Million Rebate : Conservation: Investment of $6 million to modernize lighting and air conditioning pays dividend on Friday.

For the last three years, Cal State Fullerton has carried on a campaign to become as energy-efficient and non-polluting as possible, replacing fluorescent lights with longer-lasting illumination, renovating its air-conditioning system, and constructing a laboratory with a more efficient air-filtration system.

The university spent $6 million to get most of the job done, but on Friday it will get some of that investment back.

Southern California Edison Co. will present Cal State Fullerton a $1-million rebate, which is part of a program designed to encourage customers to make energy-saving, non-polluting changes. The rebate is one of the largest ever given by the energy company, said SCE officials.

As a result of the project, the university will save 7.9 million kilowatt hours--enough electricity for about 1,500 houses a year--and more than $600,000 annually, said Jerry Keating, campus spokesman. “In the long haul, we recover the costs,” he said.

H. Fred Mickelson, regional general manager of SCE, said the rebate program started in the late 1970s, “when it became very apparent that the cost of building new power plants was high enough that it made sense to use energy more efficiently and pay rebates to encourage people to do that.”

In 1990, after Cal State Fullerton had struggled with a 25-year-old air-conditioning system, university officials sat down with SCE to discuss rebates and funding for the energy project, said Mickelson.

Cal State Fullerton’s $1-million rebate is the result of several phases of the energy-saving project, including:

* Replacement of the lighting system in which, according to Corbett, “virtually every light fixture on campus” was replaced with newer versions at a cost of $2 million. The new fluorescent tubes are four times as efficient, last thousands of hours longer and do not contain carcinogens. Photo cells tell a computer when to activate outdoor lighting, rather than having them on all the time. Edison is giving the campus a $200,000 rebate on the lighting project.

* Installation of a $4-million cooling system, including a storage tank, which stores water from a chiller at night, when overall utility use is lower. Later, the water is piped to buildings to cool them. Edison is giving a $700,000 rebate for that system.

* Construction of a laboratory facility, which was built with $20 million in voter-approved bonds, rather than with state-funded energy bonds. Corbett said the facility will not recirculate air because of concern about chemical emissions. The fumes go through an exhaust system and filter hoods. Edison gave a $50,000 rebate.

Miscellaneous alterations account for the remaining $50,000 in rebates, Corbett said.

The project is not finished. More construction is starting on the first heat recovery storage system in Southern California, said Corbett. The system, scheduled for completion in November, will store waste heat from the chiller tanks used in the air conditioning system. This will eliminate the use of boilers, which waste more energy and emit noxious fumes. Edison’s research division and the South Coast Air Quality Management District are supporting the $2.5-million project, Corbett said.

SCE Vice President Bob Bridenberker and Mickelson will present the rebate to Cal State Fullerton President Milton A. Gordon at the 2 p.m. ceremony in Langsdorf Hall.

The ceremony will also honor the late Ed Knipe, chief of energy and utilities for the CSU system. Knipe helped push for state funding and is credited with much of the organizing of the energy-saving project. He died in March, 1992, at the age of 43. A plaque will be installed on campus in his name.