The Ottumwa Community School District Early Childhood Center is a purpose-built facility for Pre-Kindergarten and preschool students. This facility addresses a need in the community for a dedicated PK facility for the district.

The district was interested in leveraging MidAmerican Energy’s Commercial Incentives program. This program provides opportunities for end-users to incorporate energy efficient features in their building by providing incentives to offset the higher first cost of these systems. The owner, architect and Bluestone’s engineering team met with MidAmerican several times during the early stages of the project to determine strategies to achieve better energy efficiency in the facility. One strategy that was accepted by the District was to utilize a geothermal heat pump system for HVAC. Bluestone’s mechanical engineering team modeled and designed the well field for the system and specified all of the heat pumps and associated hydronic piping and controls.