Rochester General Hospital received an award of more than $300,000 from New York State Energy Research and Development Authority President and CEO Francis J. Murray and Congresswoman Louise Slaughter. The money will be used to finance lighting modernization projects that Eco Consultants have estimated will save the hospital more than $47,000 annual energy costs.
Mr. Murray said the award was funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) to promote conservation and energy efforts. Rochester General Hospital is one of eight energy conservation and renewable energy project beneficiaries given to Monroe County with a total amount of $1.2 Million in federal ARRA support.
ARRA or the Recovery Act provides an exceptional level of funding to help stimulate the US economy through advancement of health care, expansion of unemployment benefits, education spending, infrastructure and development projects, particularly in the green employment sector.
Among those given the same grant previously were Canandaigua Central School District with $752,400 for the installation of wind turbine; University of Rochester received $488,000 to University of Rochester for the heating upgrade systems; $217,000 to retrofit lighting fixtures at Rush Henrietta Central School and installation of 400 occupancy sensors at Monroe Community College amounting to $216,000.
These projects were competitively chosen under the State Energy Program and are expected to decrease energy consumption, attain energy security and protect the environment.
Rochester General Hospital CEO and President Mark C. Clement expressed his profound gratitude to Rep. Slaughter and NYSERDA for the award. He said that the grant would enable the institution to continue to provide an efficient and environmentally friendly atmosphere and quality service to its citizenry.
These grants will promote green training and sustainability consulting efforts that are long overdue in this sector. Rochester Hospital is amongst the first in the state of New York to undertake such measures and the hospitals creation of sustainable practices is being widely lauded.
