GREEN ROOFS
between environment and patient outcomes is built into the design brief from day one. One of the recurring conclusions from the research is
Adding green roofs to lower, viewable areas can produce measurable clinical benefits for patients.
to good quality green space – a number that carries real weight given the current pressure on NHS estates budgets.
From concept to rooftop: real-world examples A number of healthcare organisations have already acted on this evidence, integrating green space into their estates in ways that directly benefit patients and staff. NHS Forest has been running since 2009 with the aim of increasing and improving green spaces across NHS sites throughout the UK. It now encompasses 483 sites and has seen more than 150,000 trees planted since the programme began – a tangible expression of the view that the built healthcare environment should do more to connect people with the natural world. At an individual site level, Southmead Hospital in Bristol
offers a useful example. The hospital has set itself the goal of providing a green space view for every patient. It has also created a rooftop herb garden for staff – a practical working green space that offers a genuine break from the ward environment during a shift. Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool goes considerably further. Green roofing runs across much of the building itself, and the wider site has been transformed to incorporate woodland and parkland that wrap around the hospital rather than sitting apart from it. The project is now widely referenced in discussions about what healthcare architecture can achieve when the relationship
that a view of nature from a window is often sufficient to produce a measurable clinical benefit. For estates planners, this has a practical implication: adding green roofs to lower-level roof areas can contribute to providing exactly that view for patients in adjacent or upper-floor rooms, without any requirement for those patients to leave their beds.
Managing the mounting challenge of surface water Large hospital sites, with their extensive areas of hard standing and roof coverage, place considerable demands on drainage infrastructure – and those demands are intensifying. The past two years have underlined how quickly surface water management can move from a background consideration to an urgent one. The summer of 2025 was exceptionally dry across the UK, but what followed was months of heavy, persistent rainfall. Met Office data shows that rainfall across England from September to November 2025 reached 120 per cent of the long-term average, and the winter of 2025/26 came in at 113 per cent of average – the eighth wettest winter in England since records began in 1836. These are not anomalies to be designed around, but the direction of travel that estate managers need to be prepared for. Green roofs slow the passage of water into drainage
Green roofs can support more efficient heating and cooling, help manage surface water, and have a direct bearing on the health and recovery of the people inside the building.
168 Health Estate Journal October 2026
systems in several ways. The soil substrate absorbs rainfall and releases it gradually, the vegetation takes up water directly, and a further proportion is lost back to the atmosphere through evaporation. The cumulative effect on peak flow rates is significant – a study in Pennsylvania found that an 89mm-deep green roof delayed the start of roof run-off by 5.7 hours and pushed peak run-off back by two hours, which represents a meaningful buffer when drainage systems are already under strain. Green roofs also fulfil Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS) objectives in several ways: managing runoff volumes and flow rates, providing opportunities for evapotranspiration, creating habitats, and integrating sympathetically with the surrounding environment. Under the national standards for sustainable drainage systems, SuDS is embedded in planning requirements across the UK, with mandatory application on all new projects in Wales. On a large hospital site, a well-specified green roof can make a substantial contribution to overall SuDS compliance.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156 |
Page 157 |
Page 158 |
Page 159 |
Page 160 |
Page 161 |
Page 162 |
Page 163 |
Page 164 |
Page 165 |
Page 166 |
Page 167 |
Page 168 |
Page 169 |
Page 170 |
Page 171 |
Page 172 |
Page 173 |
Page 174 |
Page 175 |
Page 176 |
Page 177 |
Page 178 |
Page 179 |
Page 180 |
Page 181 |
Page 182 |
Page 183 |
Page 184 |
Page 185 |
Page 186 |
Page 187 |
Page 188
