JOINT IHEEM NI AND ROI 2022 CONFERENCE
reductions targets set in the programme for Government for delivery every year will be challenging for every sector, but none more so than healthcare. We will each be held to account for delivering our share of the targets, and there will have to be clear reductions in actual energy use. We are now working to halve our emissions by 2030, and to be ‘Net Zero’ by 2050 – targets we cannot achieve by ourselves, and indeed over the past 15 years the HSE and SEAI have built up momentum in the health sector, learning the best and most efficient ways of working.” A significant challenge for the HSE had been resourcing; SEAI understood the benefits both of having the resources to work on the climate action required, and the ‘related challenges’. However, the speaker said, ‘even when resources are limited’, the organisation worked effectively and collaborated to bring about change.
Achievements to date William Walsh’s next slide focused specifically on the SEAI and HSE’s achievements to date, and some of the milestones in their long-term partnership. The HSE was, he explained, the Energy Performance Officer for the whole of the Irish healthcare system, including 38 voluntary hospitals and Section 39 charities. He told delegates: “The HSE is leading energy-saving actions in its own stock, and also working with those in the wider healthcare sector landscape to achieve energy targets.” Between 2005 and 2011, the HSE and SEAI had partnered on the EU CONCERTO project – a European Commission initiative within the European Research Framework Programme (FP6 and FP7) which ‘aims to demonstrate that the optimisation of the building sector of whole communities is more efficient and cheaper than optimisation of each building individually’. This, William Walsh explained, became the successful template for Ireland’s national Sustainable Energy Communities Programme (or ‘SEC’), which, having grown from one community in Dundalk to over 600 nationwide, was ‘a hugely important pillar’, and part of the
work that SEAI does ‘across the board’ now. He said: “So, in all the work we do with all of the stakeholders, the community engagement is hugely important, and that had its start in the work undertaken by the HSE and SEAI back in in 2005-2011.”
Hospital campus retrofits From 2012-2017, the speaker explained, the HSE and SEAI had worked together on the north-east retrofits for the Louth and Lourdes hospital campus and various other buildings as part of a community programme via the Public Sector Partnership, while the SEAI-supported Energy Bureau established in 2018 by the HSE had grown to a team of over 20 Energy Officers since its launch. He said: “Since 2019, the HSE Pathfinder Programme has supported shallow and single measure retrofit works in over 170 HSE buildings. In 2021, for example, this included the installation of heat pumps in Croom Orthopaedic Hospital (in Limerick), and an upgrade to the ventilation system at Beaumont Hospital in Dublin.” The ‘pipeline’ of projects continued
to grow, 2021 having seen 10 buildings selected to investigate a potential deep retrofit as part of the Deep Retrofit Pathfinder Programme, which he noted would be presented on later by John Reilly from the HSE and Orla Coyle from SEAI. He explained that the HSE has led on structured work programmes to embed an energy-efficient design approach for all new and replacement assets, with SEAI helping the Executive train over 320 project managers and design team members, including architects and engineers, on its energy efficiency design principles.
The ‘key to a successful partnership’ The SEAI speaker’s next slide focused on ‘The key to a successful partnership’. For this he said there were three key elements – drawing from ‘Organisational’, ‘Technical’, and ‘People’ areas. “On an Organisational level,” he said, “you need organisational commitment from the management team to lead from the top down. Management sets policy and commits funding and resources, an example being our very
first engagement with the HSE, with the North-East Estate Management team, who committed to partnering with SEAI on an EU project. I must acknowledge the sponsorship of Jim Curran and Peter Smyth, who brought this to the HSE CEO and Board, and the hard work on the ground from Willie Mcclean, a trailblazer for sustainable energy within the HSE. I also want to recognise the earlier speech by Dean Sullivan, a senior member of the executive of the HSE. To have a very clear and direct approach to the climate challenge that faces us is very encouraging to hear.” Looking at the next area – ‘Technical’,
William Walsh said the organisation needed technical expertise ‘to understand how and where energy is used’. The HSE had had the benefit here of ‘a knowledgeable and willing’ Climate Action and Sustainability team led by Peter Smyth, built over time, and now comprising over 20 staff looking after this element, and ‘driving the climate action and sustainability agenda throughout the health sector’.
The ‘People’ factor “The third area is ‘People’,” William Walsh told delegates. “You need the behavioural piece, whereby people are engaged and active in developing an energy-efficient culture.” This had also been led by the Climate Action and Sustainability team, with credit due to the HSE for the way they had embedded this into the organisation’s wider culture. The speaker said: “Maintaining this will be even more important for the future. For example, in 2019, the HSE, with SEAI support, delivered an ‘Engaging People’ programme for the HSE across the Dublin and Midland regions, via which over one million euros was saved.” His next slide showed how HSE was
‘on a journey’ with SEAI. The speaker said: “HSE has harnessed these elements, and this journey has included mentoring, such as the mentor support from SEAI Partnership Support Managers who work with the HSE to identify high energy users within the building stock.” Looking next at training, William Walsh
With a current capacity of 82,300, Dublin’s Croke Park stadium – the venue for the IHEEM joint NI and ROI branch conference – has been at the heart of Irish sporting life for over a century.
24 Health Estate Journal September 2022
Speakers from the higher echelons of the healthcare engineering and estate management community from both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland chatted between sessions.
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
