GREENING HEALTH CARE IN 2023 

Accelerating emissions reductions in hospital facilities 

Welcome to Greening Health Care’s 2023 program! As in the past, the annual forum at the end of the year and other regular workshops are the in-person event highlights, providing members with networking, inspiration, practical knowledge, and tools to deliver on the emissions reduction and utility cost savings potential of their own facilities. Stay tuned as we finalize the agendas, locations and dates around availability of venues, keynote speakers and panelists.

RECENT WEBINAR

Webinar: Energy Efficiency Rankings of Ontario’s Hospitals

Know where you stand! As the heat rises on climate change, every hospital needs to know their rankings and savings potential and take action now to reduce their emissions. Watch a recording of our July 26th webinar to recognize and learn from Ontario’s most energy efficient hospitals. New and old, large and small, north and south, the top-30 energy performers provide inspiration and best practices to help every hospital work towards high standards of energy efficiency. Following the webinar we will be letting all Ontario hospitals know where they stand, how much they can save and what are the best actions they can take now to save energy, emissions and money!

1. High Performance Building Systems 

This project presents the latest evidence-based energy efficiency standards for different hospital types derived from the best of recently built hospitals. Use this new guide to calibrate energy models and improve design and commissioning practices for your new hospital developments.

2. LED Lighting Retrofits in Hospitals 

A guide for procuring high performance lighting retrofits which deliver the best electricity savings, lighting quality and occupant satisfaction with an accompanying webinar posted to our events page https://greeninghc.com/events/. If you’re planning a lighting retrofit anytime soon, watch the webinar and use the guide to learn about retrofit and controls options and use of data logging and enhanced audits to improve outcomes.

3. Thermal Recovery Wheel Optimization Phase 2

One of the biggest of the real “low hanging fruit”, the first phase of this work has determined the substantial sensible and latent heat recovery and greenhouse gas emissions reduction potential through testing and control modifications to existing thermal recovery wheels in hospital air handling systems. Our thanks to Alberta Health Services, EllisDon Facility Services, North York General, Southlake and Etobicoke General for their support of this work. Phase 2 will extend the methodology to more hospitals, support implementation, monitor actual gas savings achieved and produce a best practices guide for use by hospitals everywhere in optimizing their thermal wheel installations.

4. Strategic Energy Management (SEM)

Our planned strategic energy management guide will address organizational alignment and management practices required to achieve and sustain energy efficiency and work towards low carbon operations over time. Making use of the latest utility company incentive programs, this project will produce best practice guidance for the technical aspects of utility data analysis, building automation, metering, and system testing, along with the governance, key performance indicators (KPIs), staff training, and communications necessary for success.

5. Using Hospital Accreditation and Quality Improvement Programs to Guide Energy and Emissions Reductions

This initiative will work with clinical and facilities managers to produce consensus-based recommendations for using accreditation and quality improvement to inform, direct and track progress towards high standards of energy efficiency and emissions intensity in hospitals.

6. New Hospital Performance

Watch out for the October launch of our 2023 report on performance metrics, characteristics and lessons learned from the most energy efficient new hospitals. This year’s report will include other jurisdictions across North America and England in addition to Ontario and provide standards which all new hospitals should strive to meet or improve upon. Further research is planned into the business case and technical issues for geothermal installations in different jurisdictions.

7. Transition to Low Carbon Central Plants

New high-performance hospitals are equipped with advanced central plants featuring comprehensive heat recovery and powerful automation systems. Older hospitals that are not subject to redevelopment are challenged to transition over time to low carbon plants as existing equipment reaches the end of life and the cost of carbon continues to rise. Our practical pathways methodology has been presented at previous webinars and the research continues into feasibility studies, financing options, and evaluation of operating strategies for existing combined heat and power (CHP) plants.

7. Greening the Operating Room

A comprehensive update is planned for Greening Health Care’s 2017 guide on best practices for operating room (OR) ventilation systems. This time the work is engaging clinical and infection prevention and control (IPAC) staff as well as hospital engineers in producing evidence-based guidance and specifications for testing, modifying and controlling air handling systems to verify health and safety while optimizing energy use and emissions.