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Environmentally-friendly Approach has Many Benefits By Andrea Moss "Environmentally friendly" is not a phrase that typically comes to mind when people talk about hospitals, but Palomar Pomerado Health officials say they are out to change that.
The hospital designers also say they hope to use more natural materials in the building construction, to reduce water consumption and to increase recycling, and to convince visitors to use the Sprinter train that will stop at the Escondido Transit Center. The efforts are part of a national trend to make hospitals environmentally and financially "sustainable," said Palomar Pomerado's chief architect, Mike Shanahan. "If you think of the cost of energy today, our thinking is it's never going to get any cheaper," he said. "And if it contributes to the well-being of the health care environment, we think it's the right thing to do. And we have tangible data that it lowers the cost of health care over a longer period of time." Energy monsters The new medical center is expected to cost $691 million and will be the cornerstone of a $1 billion expansion plan that the public health care district plans to carry out over the next 10 years. The new hospital will replace Palomar Medical Center in downtown Escondido and become North County's only trauma center. The district's expansion plan also calls for renovating Palomar Medical into administrative offices and specialty clinics, doubling the size of Pomerado Hospital in Poway and building several satellite medical centers in rural areas of the 800-square-mile district. A $496 million bond measure that voters approved in 2004 will help pay for the improvements, along with revenue bonds and fundraising. The push to design, build and operate environmentally friendly buildings has gained momentum in the past 20 years, with entire cities, including Seattle, joining the movement. For years, though, hospitals were largely passed over by the trend because they present major challenges, industry experts said. "Hospitals are extremely energy-hungry," said Derek Parker, chairman of Ansehn + Allen Architects Inc. and co-founder of the Center for Healthcare Design. His Bay Area firm is helping Palomar Pomerado design the new Escondido hospital. "They're 24/7, they have lots of equipment, lots of lighting, lots of needs for air conditioning, lots of needs for air being pushed through the building," Parker said. The huge energy demands at hospitals seemed to rule out any ability to meet environmentally friendly standards set for commercial and other types of institutional buildings, he and other experts said. Standards modified for health care The commercial standards are laid out by the United States Green Building Council, a building industry organization that has produced a widely accepted system for rating the "greenness" of a facility. As part of its Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design rating system, the council produced a Building Green Guide. Efforts to apply the standards to hospitals got a boost a few years ago with the debut of a modified version called "Green Guide for Healthcare." Promoters of green health care facilities include the nonprofit Health Care Without Harm, which teamed up with the federal Environmental Protection Agency, the American Hospital Association and the American Nurses Association to form a coalition known as Hospitals for a Healthy Environment, or H2E. The group provides training and other help to member health care districts and facilities seeking to make their buildings environmentally friendly. H2E spokeswoman Kelly Heekin described the "Green Guide" as a document that "has everything in one place ---- all the ways a hospital can go green (including) design, construction, operation. And for everything it says to do, it also provides the rationale." The coalition currently has about 1,200 members representing 2,000 hospitals and 4,500 other health care facilities in the United States, Heekin said. Interest in environmentally friendly building is also on the rise because of its financial benefits, Health Care Without Harm spokeswoman Stacy Malkin said. "Some things cost more up front. But if you look at the life cycle of the building, it will become cost-comparable over time and sometimes result in cost-savings over time," Malkin said. Architect Shanahan said that saving money was a key consideration for Palomar Pomerado's design team, which includes more than a dozen nurses, doctors and other district employees assigned to research "green" options. Shanahan said the district expects to spend about $1.8 million to make the new medical center a green one. The goal is to recoup that investment in five to six years, he said. The design team has done extensive cost-benefit analyses to come up with a list of options that would enable the health care district to meet that goal. Lots of possibilities The team nixed the use of solar panels because their payoff would take at least 39 years, said Shanahan. Options that made the cut or are being considered for the new hospital include: -- A thermal energy storage system that may also be installed at Palomar Medical Center and Pomerado Hospital as well as the new hospital. Shanahan and Parker both identified keeping the hospital cool as a major challenge. Comparing the energy storage system to a buried ice chest, Shanahan said it can be chilled at night when power demands and energy prices are lower, then used for cooling by day. -- "Green" roofs covered with trees and other landscaping. Shanahan said that using California succulents would require little water but provide relaxing views for hospital staff and patients. Invisible benefits include improved air quality and the reflection of less heat into the hospital than an asphalt roof, he said. -- Automated controls that turn lights off when a room is empty, remote controls that let patients turn off lights in their own rooms, and dimmers that automatically adjust lighting according to the amount of natural light coming through skylights. -- Low-flow shower heads, toilets, and other fixtures to cut water usage. -- The use of wood and natural products, and synthetic materials that emit no air-polluting gases. Switching to materials made of something like rubber, meanwhile, can make use of recycled tires, Shanahan said. -- A waste-management plan that reduces the amount of waste produced, controls the use of chemicals and allows water and other resources to be recycled. -- Hiring a team of engineers to go through the new hospital to analyze the efficiency of its mechanical equipment, energy use and operations. Such a move might seem unnecessary in a brand-new facility, Shanahan said, but studies have shown the step typically identifies problems that can eat up anticipated energy savings. Hidden benefits The district also expects to save roughly $200,000 annually on water costs, Shanahan said. Parker, whose passion for building healthy indoor environments is evident when he talks about the subject, said the real financial benefits come in the areas of employee recruitment, retention and productivity. "There's a nursing shortage (and) a shortage in most of the technical professions," Parker said. "So if you can keep people, it's a lot less expensive than if you're trying to recruit them. And you recruit them by providing a better work environment."
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Copyright (c) 2006 The Ashkin Group, LLC.. All rights reserved. |
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