MEDIA RELEASE
19 October 2016
Commitment to renewable energy earns CDHB an environmental accolade
The Canterbury DHB has today (Wednesday 19, October) been awarded an Energy-Mark Bronze Award in an official ceremony
for its commitment to energy management, by New Zealand’s leading environmental certification authority, Enviro-Mark
Solutions.
The setting for the short award ceremony was Burwood Hospital’s new boiler house – a state-of-the-art energy facility
that runs on environmentally friendly wood waste.
Presenting the award, Enviro-Mark CEO Ann Smith said the Canterbury DHB, like any healthcare organisation, has the
significant challenge to provide a reliable and constant energy source for a variety of essential medical services,
along with maintenance services for the general health and well-being of its patients and staff.
“Achieving Energy-Mark Bronze certification is a great step towards real performance improvements that will mean
Canterbury DHB will develop and a robust and efficient energy management system – reducing their impacts on the
environment and their people,” Ms Smith said.
Accepting the Energy-Mark award, Canterbury DHB CEO David Meates said energy supply and reliability is crucial to all
services at the Canterbury DHB, and a huge amount of work goes on behind the scenes to ensure that we supply and consume
energy in our facilities as efficiently as possible.
“I am absolutely delighted we are able to demonstrate responsible energy management as an organisation, and I am proud
to accept this Energy-Mark award – especially on behalf of our Canterbury DHB energy team, who have a vast amount of
experience in a very technical field,” Mr Meates said.
“The next step for Canterbury DHB is to build on our achievement in the future through meeting the requirements for
Energy-Mark Silver certification, and then finally Energy-Mark Gold.”
The new boiler house saves an estimated 6,000 tonnes CO2 emissions per year compared with using coal* to provide the
newly-expanded hospital with heating and hot water. It’s also virtually smokeless: emissions to air are controlled via
cyclones for the larger particles and a large electrostatic precipitator that captures and removes PM10 particles. Warm
air is also recirculated within the facility to help dry the stored wood.
Enviro-Mark Solutions, which runs the Energy-Mark programme, is a subsidiary of Landcare Research, a New Zealand
Government Crown Research Institute. To achieve Energy-Mark Bronze certification, an organisation has to demonstrate
significant commitment to achieving performance improvements, including the implementation of an energy management
system, objectives and targets, and the consideration of energy performance in long-term planning.
ENDS
*Figures obtained from the EECA online calculator.