Student residents and staff in Michigan State University’s Case Hall are getting an earful.

In the north wing of the residence hall, the men’s public bathroom is home to a new XLERATOR hand dryer. The dryer, made by Excel Dryer, Inc. in Massachusetts, is part of an MSU residence hall initiative to replace worn out hand dryers, showerheads and florescent light bulbs with more energy efficient versions.

“Other than being loud, there has been a very positive response to [the dryer],” said Paul Manson, facilities manager.

Excel claims the XLERATOR does a better job than most hand dryers, which take about 30 to 45 seconds and leave moisture on hands. The new dryer, according to Excel, takes 10 to 15 seconds to dry hands and uses 80 percent less energy than most dryers.

But whether new technologies in hand dryers are better than using paper towels is what Gus Gosselin calls a “great debate.”

Air time?

“The electric hand dryer manufacturers will tell you that theirs is the environmentally friendly way to dry your hands,” said Gosselin, director of building services at the MSU Physical Plant. “The paper towel industry claims the same thing since their product is renewable.

“Of course, both are partially right.”

Gosselin said it’s difficult to tell which is better, as paper manufacturing and electricity generation are both “dirty business.”

According to Excel, there is a 90 percent cost savings when hand dryers are used instead of paper towels. An advertisement on Excel’s Web site claims a public middle school using paper towels will spend more than $6,000 per year.

At MSU paper towels cost about $80,000 per year just for campus buildings where people don’t pay to live or attend activities. That $80,000 doesn’t include residence hall bathrooms. Wilson Hall, a typical MSU dorm, goes through six cases of paper towels per month, at a cost of almost $1,300 a year. Generalizing for all 21 MSU residence halls, the cost per year is about $27,300. As the testing of the XLERATOR unit in Case Hall indicates, there is growing consideration for the use of more hand dryers.

MSU keeps a contract with a paper towel company for five years at a time and gets the dispensers for free. Manson said hand dryers cost $350 to $500 and have a one-time electrician expense. The initial total investment is about $1,200 to $1,500 for one hand dryer.

Tim Knight, complex manager for Case and Wonders halls, said hand dryers also save labor because there’s no mess to clean up.

“People don’t seem to be able to hit wastebaskets very well,” Knight said. “And perhaps it doesn’t happen in women’s bathrooms, but men seem to get their jollies by plugging up a toilet or urinal with paper towels so that water runs all over.

“Labor is one of our biggest expense categories; anything we can do to keep those expenses from increasing pays off for students.”

Roll away

Shaw Hall has both hand dryers and paper towel dispensers; five years ago, there were only hand dryers.

“Students continually asked for paper towels,” said Carol Noud, manager in Shaw. “Some of them wanted to dry their hands, but many of them wanted to be able to wipe out a sink before using it.

“This made sense to me, so we put paper back in, based on student desires.”

The final design put hand dryers in prominent places for easy use, and only one paper towel dispenser, tucked away by a dishwashing/hand washing sink.

Paul Manson said students in Brody residence hall also wanted paper towels along with air dryers. Using both reduced the amount of paper towels in the bathrooms by about one third.

“People were using toilet paper to dry their hands, then throwing it on the floor,” Manson said. “We take into account the convenience to the customers. In the long-term, (hand dryers) definitely save money. But having both makes a very happy customer, and that’s the goal.”

At Warren Wilson College in Asheville, North Carolina, a new “EcoDorm” residence hall featuring energy-efficient building designs was built almost a year ago.

Sarah Keith Valentine, a member of the Campus Greening Crew at WWC, has worked with the paper towels vs. hand dryer comparison. She said the motivation to use hand dryers was to save money and become a more environmentally sustainable campus.

Hand dryers are in the EcoDorm, and a few other buildings on campus, Valentine said. Students who helped plan the EcoDorm were involved in the decision to use hand dryers.

Valentine said response to the XLERATOR hand dryers (which WWC also uses) has been mixed, with some students complaining about the noise late at night and in the morning.

Shower power

Another place MSU is looking for energy savings is in the shower. Basic showerheads and water-saving showerheads have been studied at MSU, and now some dorms use water-saving showerheads exclusively. Eight years ago, about 20 different types of showerheads were tested in Wilson Hall; now 60 percent of the showerheads there have been replaced with water-savers.

“We worked with residents to try and cut down our water usage,” Manson said. “That year, we measured and found we were saving thousands of gallons of water.”

Two other residence halls have also been converted to low-flow heads, and Manson said more dorms would follow as old units wear out.

The old showerheads were installed in 1965, around the time the residence halls were first built there. Those stainless steel units cost about $25 apiece, while the water-saving varieties cost about $6 to $8 apiece.

Megan Messana, a freshman living in Wilson Hall at MSU, didn’t know her showerhead was saving water.

“It’s great actually; there’s good water pressure,” she said. “I have a water-saver at home with the same water flow.

“It’s not like at a hotel where you just have a trickle.”

Shaw Hall is also using water savers — Symmons Industries Hydapipe showerheads were installed when Shaw was renovated during the 2001-2002 school year. The heads have a pressure-balancing system to regulate water temperature and save water. The water-flow rate is 2.5 gallons per minute, which meets minimum federal regulations.

A 1999 MSU study in Holmes Hall looked at reducing campus water consumption through water-saving devices. Students Pete Munoz, Julie Golod and Jyl Barnett researched water savings by using 2.5 gallon per minute showerheads.

Their research predicted MSU could save more than half a million gallons of water per day, generalizing the Holmes results for all residence halls. The cost of installation would be paid back in only one year, and cost savings for water-saving showers, toilets and sinks combined was close to $20,000 per year.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, a college in Troy, New York, worked on a water conservation project in 1997, to reduce water costs and integrate water-conservation education into the curriculum.

Shawn Shaw, conservation coordinator for One Earth, One People at RPI, said that low-flow showerheads are now standard during all renovations and replacements. When the initiative was taking place, low-flow heads (2.5 gallons per minute) were proposed for two residence halls, and later installed in all freshman halls.

The low-flow heads are $182 each, including labor and installation costs, to replace the head units that used eight gallons per minute. Return on investment was about three years for both water and energy. Total savings was expected to be more than $20,000 after the first three years, but Shaw didn’t have the actual-savings data.

RPI uses only paper towels in its bathrooms, according to associate professor Steve Breyman. The towels are made of 100-percent recycled content but are thrown away instead of composted, which Breyman said would be an improvement.

“It could easily be shredded and composted,” he said. “But that’s seen here as too much work for our custodians, who are truly underpaid.

“In other words, labor and environment concerns intersect.”