Green and Sustainable Changes

Green Sustainable Changes Paper


Green Sustainable Changes Paper

Hospitals have traditional been a facility that requires the largest amount of energy to maintain and operate.   Because of its importance, the suggestion to turn off a few lights will not reduce the carbon footprint that a hospital creates.   Patton –Fuller Community Hospital is a facility that can use green changes.
The area of the Patton – Fuller Community Hospital that may be in need of a green or sustainable makeover is the how the hospital manages information technology.   The information technology interlaced in the hospital is robust.   The number of elements, which includes servers, computers, and monitors that make up the network, can be found in every department of the hospital.   The operation and sustainment of the IT network requires an extensive amount of energy to keep the equipment powered.   The contribution to the carbon footprint that the network provides calls for a reduction effort.   Reduction of the energy consumption provides an opportunity for the hospital to assess the number of elements in their IT network and determine if all of the elements are necessary for the departments to function.   The hospital should seek to consolidate computers and provide PCs to essential departments only rather than to each employee.   Any reclaimed computer equipment that is reclaimed can be recycled through a trade-in program with the company that the computers had been purchased from.   The current system can be powered by alternative power sources, which can include solar arrays, include smart monitoring systems to manage power use, and energy conservation policies that encourage power-saving behavior.  
The proposal to reduce electricity consumption will focus primarily on performing an energy analysis of the hospital.   The initial analysis will involve the study of the current load that hospital pulls from the utility.   After the determination of peak usage, the hospital will need to...