Video: City Receives $122,000 As Incentive Payment From TVA

TUPELO, MISS. (WCBI) – The presentation of the check was reason to celebrate.  The city of Tupelo received $122,602  as an incentive payment from the Tennessee Valley Authority.

“It shows we are on the right track and doing the right things and we just hope to continue to improve upon those efficiency efforts and get better and better,” said Tupelo Mayor Jason Shelton.

In late 2015, the city of Tupelo partnered with Schneider Electric to take on the largest parks and recreation energy efficiency project in Mississippi.  Since then, all municipal buildings, and 27 sports fields have been outfitted with LED lighting, building automation systems and other upgrades.

Tupelo is well known as the “First TVA City” and now, the All America City has also earned the title as the “First TVA Drone City.”

Drones, like ones on display at the news conference at Fairpark, were used to perform inspections of the energy efficient upgrades.

“Especially the high lights and things like that, drones were used to inspect those and get real close and do some overhead views of those areas, drones make it safer, faster and more efficient for us to do inspections where we can save money and bring those savings down to the local rate payers and keep monthly bills as low as possible,” said Chad Wilson, of TVA.

Without a doubt the incentive check is a lot of money, but think about this, over the next 20 years the city will save about 3 million dollars in utility costs, because of the energy efficient measures in place.

The $122,000 will go to the Water and Light Department for more LED lights and other improvements.