First hospital to go green will save €40,000 a year

THE country’s first hospital to switch to renewable energy heating will reduce its carbon footprint by 800 tonnes — saving €40,000 a year.

St Columba’s in Thomastown, Co Kilkenny, is to change from oil-based fuel to biomass firing.

Renewable local wood chips will be used in the boiler and will displace most of the oil used for heating.

Installation of the new system cost €300,000. Grant support of €50,000 was approved for the Health Service Executive by Sustainable Energy Ireland.

Project manager Donal Deering said at the switch-over in Thomastown that energy was one of the HSE’s biggest costs and is always increasing.

“Our initiative at St Columba’s Hospital in Thomastown will actually result in saving money and reducing emissions,” he said.

Mr Deering predicted that the hospital’s carbon footprint will be reduced by at least 800 tonnes of CO2 a year as a result of the conversion.

“In an age where oil resources are becoming scarcer and more expensive, the viable switch to renewable sources in Thomastown is a model that will be closely looked at and may be replicated elsewhere. It is wonderful, in the case of St Columba’s, that we will now rely on a renewable Irish energy source instead of an imported fossil-based fuel.

“The project team, the staff of the hospital and those professionals who have helped us bring this about deserve great credit for their innovative work.”

St Columba’s is a 142-bed elderly care facility. It has an assessment-rehabilitation unit and a dementia care unit to cater for Alzheimer’s disease patients. There is also a day-care centre, which caters for 25 people.

Built in 1853, the hospital and its surroundings have been transformed several times.

In 1921 it was designated as the Kilkenny County Home. It was renamed St Columba’s Hospital 30 years later, at which stage it was reserved for care of the elderly.

The key HSE personnel from the Carlow/Kilkenny region involved in shaping the St Columba’s biomass conversion were local health manager Anna Marie Lanigan; hospital manager Mary O’Hanlon; project manager Donal Deering; project co-ordinator Liam Fahy; director of nursing Sheila O’Byrne; and technical services manager Charlie Murphy.