If you’re a patient at Greater Baltimore Medical Center on a really hot day, you might notice that some parts of the hospital are dimly lit.
That's because when the temperatures start soaring as they have in the record-breaking 100-degree days last week, the GBMC Green Team goes into elevated energy conservation mode.
An e-mail is distributed to hospital executives who get their staff in motion. They turn off lights in vacant rooms and pull down the shades on windows to keep out the sunlight. It might feel a little warmer in non-critical areas, such as hallways, because the hospital turns the air conditioner up a little.
Hospitals, 24-hour operations that rely on electrical equipment and are big energy users, have joined a growing number of private companies and government offices to institute measures to conserve and cut costs.
"It is similar to what you do at home but on a larger scale to make sure we're doing what we can for energy savings," said GBMC spokesman Michael Schwartzberg.
University of Maryland Medical Center also takes extra steps to conserve energy when a heat wave hits, although none of the changes are probably visible to patients.
The hospital uses steam rather than electricity to heat water during peak heat days or other times when electricity consumption may be high. They melt stored ice to cool buildings. And although this rarely happens, the hospital also can switch to emergency generators that operate from diesel fuel rather than electricity.
During last week's heat wave, when temperatures elevated to triple digits, the hospital cut its average electric use by 5 megawatts, according to UMMC spokeswoman Ellen Beth Levitt.
"All of these strategies were carefully timed to reduce our demand on the area power grid," Levitt said in an e-mailed response.
GBMC, which began its energy conservation efforts last year, reduced its energy usage by 700 kilowatts on 11 hot days in 2009, saving $30,000. It hopes to save 1,500 kilowatts, or $50,000, this year.
The Baltimore County hospital, most known for maternity and women's health, assigns hot days color codes depending on what the temperature hits. Code red days are the worst and code green is a typical day. It has had five code red days so far this summer.
Codes are assigned based on factors such as temperature and humidity level. GBMC works with the South River Consulting and Energy Network Operations Center, an energy consulting firm, to help identify high-use days.
Both hospitals have conservation efforts throughout the year.
GBMC also has employees turn off computers at the end of the day and makes sure hot water taps do not leak. In other cost-saving moves, UMMC made more local and organic foods available in the cafeteria and began using environmentally friendly plastic IV tubing, a change that saved $8,000 a year. Patient slippers are now made out of recycled cotton, a $6,000 savings.
The hospital has also started using single-stream recycling. Overall, the hospital has reduced energy consumption by 5 percent.