Author: sHq_LoGiNz

Originally published on PSEG ENERGIZE!

Public institutions frequently face a frustrating paradox: the upgrades that would save them the most money are often the hardest to fund. Nobody cuts a ribbon on a new boiler or posts photos of a replaced rooftop HVAC unit. These invisible investments — the ones that keep buildings comfortable and help conserve energy — often get deprioritized when they compete with more visible projects, such as new buildings or additions.

This had been the case at Raritan Valley Community College (RVCC), where critical infrastructure upgrades had been delayed for years. That changed when the college discovered our Engineered Solutions Program, which helped make more than $6 million in long-overdue mechanical upgrades financially feasible.

The invisible infrastructure problem

“People don’t readily see the impact of mechanical infrastructure projects,” explains Brian O’Rourke, RVCC executive director of facilities and grounds. “So, it’s hard to get funding, especially when what you need is a large piece of equipment with an equally large price tag. That need just keeps getting pushed back.”

For RVCC, the big-ticket item was the science building’s massive rooftop HVAC unit, a system the size of a small house that had been failing for nearly a decade, sometimes requiring staff to reset it three or four times on cold winter days.

“We have been talking about replacing this unit for eight or nine years,” Brian says. But instead of replacement, budget constraints repeatedly forced RVCC to resort to short-term fixes that kept the unit limping along.

How was RVCC able to fund years of deferred infrastructure upgrades?

Through our Engineered Solutions program, RVCC was able to complete a $6.1 million project with nearly 50% of the costs covered through incentives. The remaining balance will be repaid through a zero-interest, five-year on-bill repayment plan.

“For a community college, that’s a huge incentive,” Brian shares. Without it, the science building HVAC replacement, estimated at nearly $900,000, would have likely remained on hold.

What impact will the upgrades have on campus operations?

The project began with approximately $500,000 in LED lighting upgrades. We then worked with RVCC to identify additional opportunities to improve efficiency across the campus.

The broader project includes transformer replacements, new air handling units, hot water pump and boiler upgrades, and chilled water pump installations at various buildings across the campus. The project brought together multiple local contractors to implement these improvements, including electrical and mechanical work performed entirely by union labor. When completed, the project is expected to significantly reduce energy use, generating approximately $510,000 in annual energy cost savings, or an estimated $7.65 million over the project’s lifetime.ⁱ

Improvements in efficiency will be significant. For example, existing boilers operate at roughly 80% efficiency; the new condensing boilers will operate at 98%. These three new modular units will allow the college to run just one boiler during mild seasons, rather than firing full capacity for minimal demand.

Overall, the new science building HVAC unit is expected to deliver the most dramatic results once completely installed.

Originally designed for chemistry labs requiring 100% fresh outside air, the old unit kept running that way even after labs relocated to another building, conditioning outside air for a space that no longer needed it. Converting it to a recirculation system will help slash energy consumption.

“That unit alone will help pay for a lot of the other energy initiatives,” Brian notes.

But the benefits go beyond projected energy savings. For years, science building occupants dealt with unreliable temperatures and recurring system failures caused by aging equipment. When crews needed the building to be vacated for three weeks, employees didn’t push back. They were willing to be temporarily inconvenienced if it meant creating a more comfortable and reliable environment in the future.

RVCC anticipates that most upgrades will be completed by the end of this summer, with all systems operational before the fall semester.

Why did RVCC choose our Engineered Solutions Program?

For RVCC, the program provided a practical path to complete long-delayed infrastructure upgrades without requiring significant upfront capital. Incentives and flexible repayment options helped make the project achievable.

One of the biggest advantages of the program, according to Brian, is its accessibility. Similar energy efficiency initiatives frequently come with heavy administrative burdens: complex paperwork, ongoing reporting and staffing requirements that can deter participation. For lean facilities teams like those at RVCC, that can be a dealbreaker.

“This is an easy program to work with,” he says. “Especially compared to past initiatives RVCC pursued that required extensive documentation and follow-up.”

Brian also says that the contractors implementing the upgrades have moved quickly, and coordination with our teams has remained consistent throughout the project.

Turning deferred maintenance into long-term savings

For institutions trying to extend the life of aging infrastructure with patchwork solutions, RVCC’s experience demonstrates that long-planned upgrades don’t have to remain on hold indefinitely. With the right combination of incentives, financing and energy-saving opportunities, organizations can move critical projects forward while positioning themselves for long-term savings.

To learn more about how your organization can benefit from our energy efficiency programs, visit mybizenergy.pseg.com and explore available incentives, financing options and energy-saving opportunities. 

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i. Savings are based on current program estimates. Actual savings may vary based on operations, energy prices, weather, equipment performance and other factors.

Originally published by The Whiskey Wash

By Beth Squires

Beth Squires is the Deputy Editor of The Whiskey Wash and a graduate of the OurWhisky Foundation’s Atonia Programme. With over half a decade of industry experience, she is passionate about writing stories that highlight innovation, diversity, and sustainability across the global whisky landscape.

This year, Dewar’s marks 180 years since John Dewar opened a merchant shop on Perth’s High Street in 1846. Anniversaries like this usually get told through the liquid, and there is a good story there, which I covered in a separate piece with Master Blender Stephanie Macleod. There is another side to it, though, and it lies in the careful preservation and stewardship of some iconic Dewar’s artifacts, and the collection itself is unlike anything else in the world of Scotch whisky.

Jacqui Seargeant has been the person looking after the Dewar’s archive for most of her career. She holds a Master of Arts in History from the University of Glasgow and a postgraduate degree in Archive Administration from the University of Liverpool, and she joined John Dewar & Sons in 1999 as Company Archivist. She is now Global Heritage Manager and Archivist, overseeing the historical collections across the wider portfolio, and in 2025 she was made a Keeper of the Quaich.

Talking to her, what comes across most clearly is that she does not only treat the archive as a place where the past is stored. She treats it as somewhere the company goes looking for its next idea.

Dewar’s Archive: Full of Voices & Bottles

At its most basic, an archive is a place where things are kept. Dewar’s has 180 years of paperwork, bottles, photographs, and objects behind it, and most people would reasonably assume the job is to keep all of it safe and in order. That is part of what Seargeant does, but the more interesting part of the work is understanding what the material actually says about the company that made it. She is a custodian of the same 180 years as Stephanie Macleod, working from a different standpoint.

Ask Seargeant which part of the collection tells her the most, and she does not point to the business records. “It is often a combination of material that tells the richest story, but if I had to choose, I would say correspondence and our bottle collection,” she said. The letters are the part that gives her the people. “The correspondence allows you to hear the voices of the people who built the business and understand how they thought, what challenges they faced, and how ambitious they were,” she said.

The bottles do a different job. There are more than 1,000 of them, running from the 1880s through to the present day. “This element is an amazing time capsule of the company’s blending prowess and identity through time,” she said. What the run of bottles shows is a company that was busier and more commercially restless in its early years than its reputation might suggest. “You realise how creative and innovative DEWAR’S was in the early days, with numerous blends produced for different markets, price points, and consumers,” she said.

One of those early products stands out. Dewar’s made a Toddy Whisky, sold on the understanding that it would be mixed with hot water, honey, and lemon rather than drunk neat. Alongside it sits the packaging record, with White Label going back to 1899, giving Seargeant a complete timeline of how the label has shifted over more than a century while staying recognizable.

When Archives Become Inspiration For The Future

This is where Seargeant’s view of the job separates from the storage assumption. “Archives are often thought of as places that preserve history, but for us they are also places that inspire the future,” she said. In practice that means the collection feeds brand education, packaging design, the visitor experience, product development, and new releases.

The clearest example is one Macleod tells from her side too. Working through the old blending books in the archive, Macleod found processes that led to the Double Double range, the four-stage ageing series that has become the most technically ambitious part of the Dewar’s lineup. “Our Master Blender Stephanie was inspired by processes in our old blending books which led to the creation of her award winning Double Double range,” Seargeant said.

That range went on to produce the Dewar’s 32 Year Old, named Whisky of the Year at the 2020 International Whisky Competition against both blends and single malts.

Her other favorite find works differently. “One of my favorite examples was discovering historical references connecting DEWAR’S to the origins of the Highball, a story that has since become an important part of how we talk about the brand around the world,” she said. The Highball has found a wide audience again in recent years, and the archive gave Dewar’s a legitimate claim to it.

That distinction is what she keeps coming back to. “The archive gives us knowledge and authenticity. It allows us to tell stories with confidence because they are grounded in real people, real events, and real achievements,” she said.

Tommy Dewar’s Publicity Machine

One of those real people was Tommy Dewar, who, looking at the material in the archive, was clearly a figure ahead of his time. “Tommy Dewar, in particular, was constantly experimenting with new forms of advertising and consumer engagement,” Seargeant said. It is the part of the collection that tends to surprise people most. “One of the things that continually surprises people is just how forward-thinking the Dewar family was,” she said.

The company produced one of the earliest cinematic advertisements for a drinks brand, and it put up what was the largest mechanical advertising sign in Europe in the early 1900s. Both were expensive bets on formats that barely existed yet.

The point is not that Tommy Dewar invented anything that came after him, but that the instinct behind the work has stayed the same while everything around it changed. “The channels may have changed, but the desire to create memorable experiences, tell compelling stories, and connect with consumers in unexpected ways has been part of DEWAR’S DNA for generations,” said Seargeant.

15,000 Items, 200 on Show

Most of what Seargeant chooses to put on display ends up at Dewar’s Aberfeldy Distillery in Perthshire, the Highland home of the Dewar’s blend and of Aberfeldy single malt. The archive is a substantial part of what visitors come for, and it has been since the doors opened.

When the visitor centre launched in April 2000, an interactive archival museum was there from day one, and a new heritage exhibition arrived in 2023 to mark 125 years of Aberfeldy single malt. I visited in June 2024, and the historical material is not a side room you pass on the way to the stills. It runs through the whole experience.

The scale of the collection makes editing unavoidable. “The collection has more than 15,000 items in it, yet you only see about 200 in the museum at any one time, so we must be very selective, and we can change displays to keep them fresh,” Seargeant said. What reaches the museum floor is a fraction of what she looks after.

The test she applies is whether something still says anything. “We look for stories and objects that reflect enduring values such as quality, craftsmanship, and innovation,” she said. Those themes hold up across the full 180 years, which is what makes them useful as a filter.

Plenty stays in the boxes, and not because it lacks interest. Some pieces are there to explain a moment rather than to be revived, like a celebratory telegram the company received during its centenary celebrations in 1946. Others are simply enjoyable.

The archive holds a 1930s Dewar’s picture disk gramophone record and an automaton advert from the same period that moves when you press a button, both of which were at the cutting edge when they were made. “The goal is partly to recreate the past, but also to help people understand where the brand has come from while continuing to move it forward,” Seargeant said.

Seeing The History of Dewar’s In Person

What struck me on the tour was how much of the archive is put within reach rather than kept behind glass at a distance. In the distillery museum, there is a replica blending room, fronted by a shelved wall of old trade samples that Dewar’s would once have used to test combinations. Among them are a Macallan distilled in 1919, a St. Magdalene from 1924, and a Dalmore from 1909, three names that carry very different weight now than they did when someone shelved them as working stock.

Standing in front of that wall is the moment Seargeant’s point about knowledge and authenticity stops being abstract. The bottles were not collected to be impressive. They were kept because someone needed them, and they survived because the company kept hold of its own working material for long enough that it became history.

The First Award of 1,500

With a collection this size, picking a favorite is not a fair question. So I put it to Seargeant a different way, asking which single item she would point to for someone who has never explored Dewar’s before, and what it would tell them. She goes to the beginning. “I would probably choose the company’s first award certificate and medal from 1886,” she said. It was the first of more than 1,500 the company would go on to collect, the run that makes Dewar’s the world’s most awarded blended Scotch whisky.

What she likes about it is what it was for. “John Dewar established a company based on quality; his early blends were aimed at the well-to-do who expected the best,” she said. His sons carried the same approach forward. “His sons continued that ethos of going the extra mile to make our products stand out from the crowd, which continues in the company to this day,” she said.

The awards all live in the archive, which is where Seargeant’s thinking about the whole collection comes together. “All of the awards are kept safely in our archive collection because they are the result of everything we do today, the external validation of the dedication to quality and innovation which spans generations,” she said.

Dewar’s at 180: Still Worth Keeping

Eighty years separate John Dewar’s first medal from the telegram that marked the company’s centenary, and another eighty separate that telegram from the anniversary Dewar’s is marking now. All of it sits in the same collection, looked after by someone whose job is to keep it in order and to know what is in it well enough to recognize when something becomes useful again.

That is what 180 years of history looks like in practice. The old blending books produced a modern range, the historical references gave the Highball back its provenance, and the medals still explain what the company was set up to do. Seargeant’s work makes sure those things stay findable, which is how the past keeps earning its place in the present.

Click here to read more on The Whiskey Wash

Commitments in Action

Community Partnerships for Health

In 2025, DaVita expanded its work with the YMCA to support chronic kidney disease (CKD) education and prevention. Focused on promoting access to care for all, the collaboration brings free health screenings and culturally-attuned health education to cities nationwide.

This year, DaVita’s Community Health Experience brought no-cost kidney health screenings and education to Orlando, Houston and Los Angeles, resulting in more than 1,200 screenings. The YMCA, the American Diabetes Association, and other national and local organizations joined DaVita to help extend the initiative’s reach and impact in local communities.

“It’s so important to know your numbers. As someone living with diabetes and other health conditions, I hadn’t had a kidney screening before, so I was glad to get one for free today.”

— Screening participant in Houston

Read more in DaVita’s 2025 Community Care Report

LONDON, England, August 4, 2026 /3BL/ – Antea Group UK is pleased to announce that it has been named an Accredited Consulting Partner by EcoVadis, the global standard for resilient, sustainable supply chains. Accredited Consulting Partners are formally equipped to help businesses complete sustainability assessments, review scores, and improve Environment, Labour and Human Rights, Ethics and Sustainable Procurement practices.

As an EcoVadis Consulting Partner, Antea Group UK helps organisations prepare for and complete their EcoVadis assessments including guiding clients through the assessment process, identifying gaps, strengthening documentation, and implementing practical improvements aligned with EcoVadis methodologies and best practices.

Accredited Consulting Partners are carefully selected based on their experience and expertise and must complete rigorous training on EcoVadis’ methodology and assessment process through the EcoVadis Academy. To qualify, partners must demonstrate a deep understanding of local environmental, ethical and human rights regulations and issues, and have completed the EcoVadis assessment for their own business. By joining the EcoVadis partner network, Antea Group UK enhances its ability to deliver tailored, high-impact support to clients seeking to benchmark and improve their sustainability performance.

“Becoming an Accredited EcoVadis Consulting Partner reflects our commitment to helping organisations navigate evolving sustainability expectations and reporting frameworks,” said Dan Ellis, Sustainability and ESG Practice Leader. “We look forward to supporting our clients in strengthening their sustainability programmes and achieving meaningful results through the EcoVadis platform.”

Antea Group UK’s advisory services are designed to help organisations not only achieve strong EcoVadis scores, but also embed sustainability into their operations, risk management, and supply chain strategies, driving long-term value and resilience.

For more information about Antea Group UK’s sustainability and EcoVadis support services, please visit: https://anteagroup.uk/services/ecovadis

About Antea Group UK

Antea® Group is an environment, health, safety and sustainability consultancy. By combining strategic thinking with technical expertise, we do more than effectively solve client challenges; we deliver sustainable results for a better future. We work in partnership with and advise many of the world’s most sustainable companies to address ESG business challenges in a way that fits their pace and unique objectives. Our consultants equip organisations to better understand threats, capture opportunities and find their position of strength. We maintain a global perspective on ESG issues through not only our work with multinational clients, but also through our sister organisations in Europe, Asia, and Latin America and as a founding member of the Inogen Alliance. 

By David Freese

Although the heat of summer can increase electricity use and energy costs, Entergy is committed to helping you stay cool and save money throughout the warmer months with bill-management tools and resources. Our online Bill Toolkit connects you to energy-efficiency tips and resources, as well as information about bill-management and financial-assistance options.

Managing bills with payment options

Entergy offers several flexible payment options designed to make it easy for you to choose when, where and how you receive your bills.

• Pick-A-Date gives you the flexibility to choose the payment date that works best for your schedule.
• Level Billing helps you avoid seasonal ups and downs by giving you a more predictable bill each month.
• PaperFREE lets you receive your bill by email as soon as it’s ready and gives you instant access to two years of billing history.
• AutoPay saves you time and helps you avoid late fees by automatically deducting your payment from your bank account each month.

If you need more ways to manage your bill, we’re here to help. You can check our mobile app or myEntergy to see if you automatically qualify for deferred payment arrangements or payment extensions.

Finding financial assistance

If you need help paying your bill, we’re here for you. Throughout the summer, our “Beat the Heat” program provides added support to help customers and communities stay cool and manage their energy costs. The program offers bill payment assistance, free fans and energy‑efficiency kits, and it can connect you with local community partners.

Entergy partners with local and state organizations to connect qualifying customers with financial assistance, including:

• The Power to Care program, which provides emergency bill-payment assistance to older adults and customers with disabilities.
• Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP, which provides financial assistance for energy bills and other energy-related expenses.
• Single Stop, which helps customers quickly and confidentially check their eligibility for federal, state and local financial assistance.

Tracking energy use through myAdvisor

You can also set electric‑usage alerts and track your daily energy use with bill‑management tools like myAdvisor, available through your myEntergy account. Keeping an eye on your usage over time can help you budget more confidently by spotting patterns that may lead to higher bills. With the myAdvisor dashboard, you can easily view your usage and cost details, bill history, projections, analyzer tools and more. If you’re using the Entergy mobile app, tap the “usage” tab to access this information.

For more ways to save energy and money, customers can visit BillToolkit.entergy.com.

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