A window and exterior door replacement project at Palmerton Area High School is set to wrap up this month.

Over 150 windows are being replaced in the guaranteed energy savings project that the McClure Company has said will save the district around $94,000 over 20 years.

“This project is going really well,” Joe Faenza, Palmerton’s facilities director said on Tuesday. “As of today, McClure is totally committed to be substantially complete for the school to open Aug. 30, with no interruption to education.”

The project, with Penn Builders Inc. as the contractor, is estimated to cost just shy of $1.7 million, but the district was awarded $250,000 through a Pennsylvania Energy Development Authority COVID-19 Restart Grant because the window replacement was halted by the pandemic.

Taking into account the grant and energy savings, the financial impact to the district is estimated at $1.35 million.

“The window install will be completed this week,” Faenza said. “The doors actually came in a week early and are being installed. Throughout the project when the rooms are complete, the contractor does a preliminary cleaning and then our staff goes in for a final cleaning and gets the classrooms ready for the teachers to come in.”

The windows and doors at the high school match those previously replaced at the adjoining junior high school. The project aims to lower the school’s energy use more than 6%, or an estimated 541 MMBtu, annually, for a savings of more than $94,000 over 20 years. The energy conservation aims to achieve a 32-ton reduction in carbon dioxide emissions.

All the windows get new blinds, which is already making a difference according to High School Principal Paula Husar.

“It’s making a big difference with the air conditioning with the sun not nearly as bad as it was before because they’re tinted,” Husar said of the windows. “I can vouch for the change. We don’t have to keep the air nearly up as high.”

Crews previously located asbestos in the white caulk around the windows and in the cement board for the exterior soffit, where the wall and the roof meet.

The asbestos was remediated, Faenza said, and new soffit will be added.

“The soffit replacement outside could be one of the things left over after school starts, but it would just be that and maybe a few punch list items,” Faenza said. “We had a meeting scheduled for this week to review progress, the completion schedule and turnover to the district.”

The high school courtyard, Faenza said, is also going to be restored, with new mulch, topsoil and reseeding scheduled for completion.