Anne Arundel Medical Center Achieves Gold LEED Standard

Anne Arundel Medical Center officials planned for years to make the hospital's new patient tower a green, sustainable building.

That work has paid off with a seven-story structure that reduces water usage 33 percent and conserved 18 to 20 percent energy, inlcuding 90 percent conservation on lighting the operating rooms with LED lights.

And Tuesday afternoon, AAMC was rewarded for that work with a Gold Level LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council.

It is the only acute care facility in the state to receive that level of designation and is one of only 183 healthcare sites in the country to attain the gold level, officials said.

"As one of the busiest hospitals in the state of Maryland with more than 30,000 inpatient admissions, we've had to be innovative and look at all of our practices to see where we could be more environmentally responsible," Victoria Bayless, AAMC president and CEO, said in a release. "Unlike other buildings, we don't have the option of turning the lights off at 5 p.m."

The hospital unveiled , which doubled the size of existing space with a new pediatric emergency department, 50 new patient rooms and eight new operating rooms at its Parole campus.

"We went for LEED under the commercial building class," said Carolyn Core, AAMC senior vice president corporate services, during Tuesday's award ceremony. "So the fact we've been able to achieve LEED gold really means even more than doing it under the healthcare for LEED. I'm very, very proud of this."

Anne Arundel County Councilman Chris Trumbauer, who represents District 6, which includes most of Greater Annapolis, praised the hospital's efforts and commended leaders for committing to the effort from the beginning.

"How great is it that the place you come to get healthy is a healthy building," he said. "I mean, that is fantastic."

Charlotte Wallace, AAMC's sustainability coordinator, said in 2005 the hospital produced 3 million pounds of trash, which was incinerated. Now, 20 percent is recycled and only 25 is incinerated. The rest is taken to a landfill.

Here's some of the other green aspects that helped AAMC achieve gold:

• 16,700 square feet of living roof, with 24,000 plants, 80 percent of them locally grown.
• 33 percent savings in water usage with low-flow fixtures and local plants that require less water, eliminating the need for irrigation systems.
• 18 to 20 percent energy conservation by installing an efficient HVAC system.
• 90 percent energy conservation on lights alone in operating rooms by using LED lights.
• 1,750 tons of waste were diverted during construction from the landfill.
• 2,100 pounds of alkaline batteries and 7,000 pounds of UPS batteries were collected and recycled in 2010.
• 87 percent of the steel in AAMC's beams and columns is scrap.

Wallace said the goal now is to continue education throughout the hospital on how each staff member can contribute to the green goals. She said many workers have even asked for help in using some of the techniques at home.

"Everyone has to understand how their little piece interacts and impacts the sustainabilty of the hospital as a whole," Wallace said.