PPG Industries donated approximately $8,000 worth of glass to Pittsburgh-based Angels’ Place to enable the installation of 142 new energy-efficient windows at its Swissvale facility.

John Arch, president of Angels’ Place board of directors, said his fellow directors and staff have been applying for grants and raising funds for several years with the goal of installing more energy-efficient windows in the half-century-old building to reduce heating and cooling bills.

“Our old windows consisted of a thin metal frame and glass,” says Arch. “We’ve owned the building for 25 years, and renovations to it have been a longstanding project for us. Installing new windows was on our to-do list for a very long time.”

PPG Industries’ donation allowed Angels’ Place to replace existing single-pane windows with energy-saving insulating glass units (IGUs) constructed with two panes of advanced low-E glass separated by an insulating spacer. The IGUs, manufactured by Kawneer’s Traco division in Cranberry Township, were installed in June.

On the south façade, the IGUs are fabricated with tinted Solarbronze glass and Solarban 67 glass, an advanced solar control, low-E glass introduced by PPG last year. In the spring, summer and early fall, that helps Angels’ Place save energy by reducing demand for artificial lighting and air conditioning, two of the facility’s largest sources of energy consumption, according to the PPG announcement.

On the north façade, the new windows are fabricated with Sungate 500 glass, a passive low-E glass that transmits 74 percent of the sun’s available light along with most of its heat energy. That will help cut lighting and heating costs in the winter.

“It used to get a lot hotter inside than it does now with the new windows, and the glass makes a huge difference in the physical appearance of our facility,” says Sarah Dargay, an administrative assistant at Angels’ Place. “It’s such an old building, and this is definitely an upgrade.”