2018 Hospital Construction Survey Addresses Hurricane Hardening

Designing and building central plants for hospitals is no longer limited to efficient systems with redundancy for critical components.  The lessons learned in Texas and Florida after major hurricanes are leading to changes in design and construction approaches for medical systems and similar environments.

According to the 2018 Hospital Construction Survey, conducted by The American Society for Healthcare Engineering, 89 percent of facilities professionals consider “resiliency” when designing and building new spaces.  Resiliency in construction means structures and components that resist both natural and human caused disasters, and allow for fast recovery after events.

Techniques include watertight storm gates, installing generators on higher floors and even flood walls. At Greenland Enterprises, our approach includes hardening central plants, and creating more self-sufficiency for hospitals by installing their own power generation facilities that can cover short-term power and utility outrages.

While many strategies are location-specific – specifying and installing hurricane-force glass in coastal areas, for example – our overall goal is to look for opportunities to strengthen critical system reliability on every project.

The same survey indicated more than 45 percent of the facilities professionals had experienced winter storms and 66 percent experienced power outage incidents during the previous three years.  The article has more details about resilient design along with specific examples. You can read the full article in Health Facilities Management Magazine, here.

If you are responsible for updating a central plant, power generation, boiler controls or similar infrastructure in a hospital or similar environment, give the experts at Greenland a call to talk about your needs, the regional environmental threats and the overall design elements that should be considered with any new project.