Practising Green Healthcare

'Green Building Makes Us Happier & Higher Performing'

The one-day conference held by Hosmac India Private Limited provided the latest on green practices in healthcare

Anshu Taneja

Sridhar Rajagopal

Ketan Soni

Aalok Deshmukh

Sameer Mehta

The benefits of going green in sterilisation are that it protects the environment, protects patients, healthcare workers, conserves water and electricity, reduces paperwork and the burden of storing record, saves on cumbersome installation and monitoring and drastically slashes costs, said Anshu Taneja, Johnson & Johnson Limited. Taneja was speaking on 'Green Revolution in Sterilisation', a conference on 'Practising Green Healthcare' on June 27 in Mumbai. The conference was organised by Hosmac Knowledge Forum, an initiative by Hosmac India Private Limited. Express Healthcare was the media partner for the event.

Speaking on 'Energy Efficiency in Hospital Engineering', Pradeep Nadkarny, Executive Director, Spectral Services Consultants Private Limited, Mumbai, said, "While energy use for medical equipment is a functional necessity and can not be avoided, energy use for services system can be optimised through careful equipment and system design." He pointed out that HVAC system is one of the largest energy consumers in all services systems. Almost 30-50 per cent of a hospital's energy consumption is attributed towards HVAC system. His suggestions for energy saving measures included use of high efficiency chillers, optimisation of chilled water, use of variable frequency drives in AHU fans, compressors, cooling towers, use of airfoil blades in AHUs and optimum duct/ pipe sizing, etc.

Speaking on 'Thinking Green Hospitals Pre and Post Construction', Aalok Deshmukh, Architect, LEED A, said, "A green building is that one makes people healthier, happier, and higher-performing, creates delight when entered, well-being when occupied, regret when departed, takes nothing, wastes nothing, and does no harm, is net producer of energy, clean water and costs less to build and operate." While speaking about water usage in green buildings, he suggested that one must reuse and recycle water and use rain water harvesting. In site selection, one must reduce site disturbance, minimise built area, restore native habitat and maximise pervious surfaces and in using materials, one must reduce, reuse and recycle and use non-toxic material selection.

Sameer Mehta, COO, Hosmac Projects, lamented that the selection of hospital sites are seldom based on the criteria of eco sensitivity. "Many wetlands, agricultural areas are taken up for development. Buildings are designed leaving the pre-requisite setbacks from the plot boundary—allowing the builder with a bigger footprint which translates into more usable space. Much of the land available is inevitably treated and designed as hard-scape for vehicular movement, parking spaces, pedestrian areas, etc, more concrete paved areas or even asphalt-treated areas. Site development more often than not translates into lesser 'relief' areas, which means lesser green spaces, thus leads to increase in the 'heat island effect',” he said.

He added that minimising site disruption associated with construction practices leads to protection of the health of the ecosystems. He further suggested protecting and enhancing the site's existing natural areas as a therapeutic resource for patients, staff, and visitors, sifting the building near mass transit systems for ease of people transporting vehicles which reduce emissions by using alternative fuel— thereby contributing to healthier air quality and reducing the heat island effect, thereby reducing energy costs. He suggested use of designed window openings which take in enough light and ventilation for patient, but reduces on the heat intake, use of double wall that reduces heatloads, high-performance glass that reduces heat loads, use of curved facades that maximises natural light intake and use of covered atrium as breathing spaces.

Speaking on 'Energy Efficiency in Hospital AC', Ketan Soni, Deputy GM, Blue Star, pointed out that air conditioning is number one energy guzzler in a hospital, consuming 35 to 50 per cent energy, "No legislation exists to design energy-efficient hospitals. Though a revised National Building Code is in the pipeline, but does not cover energy saving in hospitals. And to top that, Bureau of Energy Efficiency published Energy Conservation Building Code states energy efficiency as a state subject," he informed. He cited NABH guidelines which states that OTs of all HCOs should have central AC unit as per the criteria laid down under IPHS standards. He further added that the air conditioning system should address air movement, air changes, air ventilation (positive air pressure), temperature and humidity.

Jagruti Bhatia,COO, Hosmac Consulting Services, spoke on 'Greening Healthcare Operations' and Pradeep Rajagopal from Armstrong, spoke on 'Green Concepts in Flooring and Ceiling in Healthcare'. "A patient room should be tranquil and have pleasant environment and it should have minimum noise and disturbance. A doctor's treating room need to maintain speech confidentiality and patient privacy," added Rajagopal. While speaking on acoustics design in healthcare, he pointed out how acoustics can help the conversation between doctor and patient be intelligent and confidential.

The session ended with an engaging discussion on 'Can Hospitals Really be Green?" The panelists for the session were Satish Bhalerao, Hosmac India Private Limited, Amit Chadda, Schiender India, General Vij, Hinduja Hospital and Aalok Deshmukh, Architect, LEED A.

EH News Bureau