For over 100 years, the Como Park Zoo & Conservatory has played a vital role in meeting the recreational needs of Saint Paul residents and visitors. The variety of building types on the zoo campus—including the 65,000-square-foot Visitor Center, the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory, and animal exhibit buildings—require dependable heating, cooling, ventilation, and water filtration year-round to meet high standards for animal care. These operations lead to substantial energy use and carbon emissions throughout the year.
Description
The City of Saint Paul is committed to the decarbonization of the Como Park & Zoo over the next decade to align with its broader goal of achieving carbon neutrality in municipal operations. In 2016-2017, Como Park & Zoo staff worked closely with Xcel Energy to conduct energy studies and develop a campus-wide energy efficiency plan that could reduce energy use at the campus by 20%. In 2022, the city also completed a Geothermal Feasibility Study for Como Zoo. Both of these efforts identified opportunities for upgrading heating and cooling systems to address operational challenges, decrease maintenance costs, improve energy efficiency, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions from zoo operations.
The City of Saint Paul received $2.2 million in FY2023 Federal funding to support the replacement of Como Zoo’s natural gas steam boiler heating in the Primates Building with a more energy-efficient geothermal heat pump system. The Polar Bear Outpost is also being upgraded to a geothermal system. Construction began in fall 2024 on these projects, and the Primates and Polar Bear geothermal heat pump systems will go into operation in fall 2026.
The City also completed a range of other energy efficiency measures across the zoo campus in 2024-2025, including LED lighting upgrades, building envelope improvements, and Building Automation System and controls updates. Collectively, these energy improvements are projected to save $50,000 in energy costs per year for Como Zoo. Construction updates for Como Zoo's decarbonization projects are available here.
