Green Guide Research Articles

The Beat

The Beat

Viewpoint: Going Green in the Emergency Department

Viewpoint: Going Green in the Emergency Department

Learning from Past Mistakes: Future Regulation to Prevent Greenwashing

The term “greenwashing” refers to false or misleading environmental claims in advertising. This Note gives an overview of various laws that may be applied to greenwashers and the “Green Guides,” the Federal Trade Commission’s nonbinding guidance covering the application of the Federal Trade Commission Act to environmental claims. This Note argues that greenwashing is a persistent problem for consumers and the environment and that existing laws are not sufficient to prevent it. It suggests that additional federal regulation is needed to curb greenwashing, and that regulation should specifically define terms and be uniform across the country. Unlike the Green Guides, future greenwashing regulation should be binding and enforceable.

친환경 병원경영 : 3개 대학병원 사례를 중심으로

The purpose of this study is to investigate the strategies and the experiences of 3 university hospitals relevant to environmentally-friendly strategy in their hospitals and to find out the implication for spreading the environmentally-friendly hospital management to other Korean hospitals. The study was progressed from October to November 2010 through the in depth interview with middle manager of the hospitals. Interview items about environmentally-friendly hospital management were selected from ISO 14001, Korean Green Management Certification Scheme, Green Guide Operation Version 2.2 of GGHC, Eco-ChecklistTM, Self-Assessment Tool of "Practice Greenhealth" and some accreditation credits of LEED, BREEAM, GreenStar. The case study result implies that the following strategies are so critical to settle environmentally-friendly hospitals in Korea: 1)understanding about fundamental concept of environmentally-friendly hospital, 2)organizing green teams, 3)purchasing environmentally-friendly goods, 4)benchmarking other successful hospitals, 5)adopting easy & reasonable policy first, 6)managing accumulated data & performance about energy efficiency, and 7)educating the employee about environmentally-friendly hospitals strategies. Hospitals have to keep in pace with the change in government policy and scheme like as GHG & Energy Target Management System, Korean Green Management Certification Scheme, ESCO, and so on for achieving the successful environmentally-friendly hospitals.

Case study: Medical office building designed without regard for acoustical privacy.

A newly constructed medical office building was designed (without the aid of an acoustical consultant) such that registration, waiting, and check‐out areas are closely spaced and lack architectural separation, making private verbal exchange of information impractical. A survey of patients conducted by the owner shortly after the building opened indicated that lack of oral privacy is the leading criticism of the facility. Measurements of existing privacy Index between several talker/listener position pairs demonstrate extreme deficiency relative to criteria provided by the Facilities Guidelines Institute, Green Guide for Health Care, and others. Reconfiguration would be prohibitively expensive, leaving electronic sound masking as the only practical option for improving privacy. However, the masking level that would be required to achieve adequate privacy would exceed that recommended for occupant comfort. The owner is faced with balancing the risk of litigation for breach of privacy law with the cost associated with upgrading the facility for compliance. Measured data, calculations, and an examination of the risks and benefits of various upgrade options will be presented.

Harmonizing national & international speech privacy guidelines.

Absent leadership from the U.S. federal government, the process of developing (and continuously improving) consistent speech privacy guidelines for healthcare facilities, is like herding cats. Nevertheless, progress continues. 1 year after the release of the FGI 2010 Guidelines (and 15 years after Congress passed HIPAA) the first code‐level U.S. guidelines for speech privacy, noise, and vibration in healthcare facilities were released, and several leading groups have agreed to cite the 2010 Guidelines as their sole “reference standard.” These groups are as follows: the Department of Health and Human Services (HIPAA), the Veterans Administration, the Centers for Disease Control, 38 regional authorities having jurisdiction (AHJ's), the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED for Health Care, the Green Guide for Health Care, 48 state code authorities, and most recently, the International Green Code Council. What is left? the Joint Commission, the Department of Defense, the World Health Organization, and others. Meantime, work on the 2014 edition of the Guidelines is already underway with important updates to the speech privacy section. Since the FGI Guidelines are actively used in 16 countries, it is imperative to involve the global acoustical community in the research and development needed to strengthen them. What is the best way forward?

Harmonizing national and worldwide acoustical guidelines for healthcare.

In the absence of leadership from the U.S. Federal Government, the process of developing (and continuously improving) consistent acoustical guidelines for healthcare facilities is like herding cats since many independent authorities compete with each other. Nevertheless, progress continues. 1 year after the release of the FGI 2010 Guidelines—the first code-level, comprehensive U.S. guidelines in sixty years for noise and vibration in healthcare facilities—several groups have agreed to cite the Guidelines as their sole “reference standard”: the Department of Health and Human Services (responsible for HIPAA), the Veterans Administration, the Centers for Disease Control, 38 regional AHJ's (Authorities having Jurisdiction), the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED for Health Care, the Green Guide for Health Care, 48 State code authorities, and most recently, the International Green Code Council. What is left? The Joint Commission, the Department of Defense, the World Health Organization, and others. Meantime, work on the 2014 edition of the Guidelines is already underway. Since the FGI Guidelines are actively used in 16 countries, it is imperative to involve the global acoustical community in the research and development needed to strengthen them. Can ICBEN help with this task? What is the best way forward?

Selling green: US FTC releases proposed revisions to the “Green Guides”

Selling green: US FTC releases proposed revisions to the “Green Guides”

The Beat

The Beat

“Porky Times”: A Brief Gastrobiography of New York’s The Spotted Pig

“Porky Times”: A Brief Gastrobiography of New York’s The Spotted Pig

Green Washing

In a United States where climate change legislation, concerns about foreign oil dependence, and mandatory curbside recycling are becoming the “new normal,” companies across a variety of sectors are seeing the benefit of promoting their “greenness” in advertisements. Many lay vague and dubious claims to environmental stewardship. Others are more specific but still raise questions about what their claims really mean. The term for ads and labels that promise more environmental benefit than they deliver is “greenwashing.” Today, some critics are asking whether the impact of greenwashing can go beyond a breach of marketing ethics—can greenwashing actually harm health?

Sustainable Food: A Conversation with Jamie Harvie—Executive Director, Institute for a Sustainable Future

Jamie Harvie, PE, is a civil engineer and presently serves as Director of Health Care Without Harm's Healthy Food in Health Care Initiative and as Executive Director for the Institute for a Sustainable Future, a not-for-profit organization based in Duluth, MN. He also serves on the steering committee for the Green Guide for Healthcare Construction—a best practices guide for healthy and sustainable building design, construction, and operations for the health care sector. Mr Harvie is an internationally recognized toxics expert and was instrumental in the negotiations with major pharmacy chains that successfully resulted in a national voluntary phase-out of mercury thermometer sales. In 2009, he was recognized as a “national thought leader” by the Natural Resources Defense Council for his leadership on sustainable health care food. His energy and vision are a driving force in changing the way food is produced and distributed so that it is not only nutritionally rich, but also environmentally sustainable. A Glossary of Terms used in this article may be found in the Sidebar: Glossary. Motivated by impacts on poor nutrition, increased antibiotic-resistant bacteria, poisoned air and water, food-borne pathogens, and the potential health effects of climate change, leaders from the health sector are backing practices and policies that support sustainable agriculture and a healthier food system. In this interview, sustainable food system advocate Jamie Harvie addresses the big stake the health sector has in the way food is produced and distributed.

Acoustics and the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification—Why education and healthcare came first.

Three decades of Washington neglecting the noise problem in America resulted in general ignorance of and data about human health impacts. This is true with politicians, agency heads, foundations, doctors, educators, architects and builders—whether they “advocate green policies” or not. So when LEED redefined the term “environmental quality” to include acoustics, they focused on “populations at risk”—children (schools), and sick people (healthcare facilities where scientific research on human subjects is routine). Meanwhile, healthcare professionals became attuned to noise and privacy from HIPAA and the patient‐centered‐care movement. In 2005, the Facility Guidelines Institute, which each re‐issues the 60‐year‐old Guidelines for Design and Construction of Healthcare Facilities every 4 years resolved to address this problem. We commissioned TC‐AA.NS.SC to develop comprehensive acoustical guidelines which were completed in 2006 and launched this January. Once drafted, the acoustical guidelines were quickly piloted for LEED by Green Guide for Healthcare, and then the LEED Environmental Quality Technical Advisory Group adopted them as the Reference Standard for LEED HC. From HC it will find broader acceptance in other LEED programs. This process ensures that acoustics re‐enters public policy supported by independent, transdisciplinary research on human health impacts and by multiple rounds of peer review in healthcare.

Incentivizing the Daylit Hospital: The Green Guide for Health Care Approach

Daylight is usually mentioned immediately after reduced energy use in conversations about sustainable building design, yet in North America, daylight remains the most-asked-for/least-delivered aspect of the caregiver work environment. In Europe, essentially the same care practices continue to be accommodated in daylit building configurations. Recognizing that the daylighting credits in Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) for new construction (NC) are more difficult for large healthcare projects to achieve during the design process, and that two daylighting credits are probably not enough of an incentive to change North American healthcare design practice, the Green Guide for Health Care (GGHC) has both simplified the process of calculating daylight achievement levels and increased the number of daylighting credits available from two to five.

Sustainable Architecture for Health: A Mindset Shift

The healthcare industry is in a pivotal position to lead the 21st-century reintegration of environment, health, and economic prosperity. By critically reinventing the hospital as a regenerative place of healing, marshalling purchasing power, and modeling health and wellness within a society in critical need of alternatives to fast food and retail culture, the healthcare industry can signal a new relationship to healing and health. (Guenther & Vittori, 2008)Moving to a Regenerative Healthcare ModelThe quote that closes our book, Sustainable Healthcare Architecture (Guenther & Vittori, 2008), was meant to usher in a broader, more relevant role for the healthcare industry in the development of sustainable design thinking, one that stands in sharp contrast to an early and widely held belief that sustainable design is about the negative consequences of production and the consumption of resources-that is about less. The mantra of reduce/reuse/recycle must be re-envisioned through the lens of healthcare as resilient/restorative/ regenerative. This is a critical distinction, because the former view fosters a dialogue based on the fear that reducing resources- whether energy, water, or building materials- produces less effective healthcare environments (Shepley, Baum, Ginsberg, & Rostenberg, 2009). On the other hand, the latter view, regenerative design, offers an opportunity to align the ecological profile of the built environment with the core mission of healthcare-that is, healing.Sustainable architecture as practiced in healthcare has, from its inception, been grounded in protecting health at all levels-building occupant (or site inhabitant), community, and global (American Society for Healthcare Engineering, 2002; Green Guide for Health Care, 2007). Former director general of the World Health Organization Lee Jong-Wook, MD, in the foreword to the Health Synthesis Report of the Millenium Ecosystem Assessment (Corvalan, Hales, & McMichael, 2005), challenged the healthcare sector to recognize this core value:Nature's goods and services are the ultimate foundations of life and health, even though in modern societies this fundamental dependency may be indirect, displaced in space and time, and therefore poorly recognized. This [is] a call to the health sector, not only to cure the diseases that result from environmental degradation, but also to ensure that the benefits that the natural environment provides to human health and well-being are preserved for future generations. (Corvalan et al., 2005, p. ii)Medicine cannot continue indefinitely oblivious to the large-scale constraints of ecosystems, which lie outside the four walls and beyond the property boundaries (and hence the direct control) of most U.S. healthcare systems. The healthcare sector should not have to argue that delivering highquality services entails excess waste production, toxic chemicals, and the disproportionate usage of energy and potable water-or that saving lives stands apart from the broader concerns of ecosystems and the environment. As healthcare expands and devours greater financial and labor resources in the United States, becomes larger and more ecologically intensive. In the coming years, as climate change alters weather patterns and disease vectors, will become more important to invest in and produce a resilient infrastructure to meet expanded healthcare delivery challenges. Aligning our built environments with regenerative design thinking will help us meet this future and, in the process, reinvent our hospitals. This requires a significant mindset shift.What Is a Shift?Mindset is the most important challenge to designing a successful, sustainable building. describes the mental models that form one's view of the world, green building, and healthcare design-the prevailing paradigm. Mindset can be thought of as the implicit worldview that we carry without even realizing that we're carrying it (Malin, 2005, p. …

Going Green: A New Design Imperative

Is the New Red, White and Blue is the title of chapter in Thomas L. Friedman's book entitled Hot, Flat and Crowded. This thought-provoking book analyzes how the world has arrived at the Energy-Climate Era, in which there are significant energy supply and demand imbalances, dependence on fossil fuels, and other environmentally unfriendly practices that threaten our climate and result in substantial challenges to our future health and well-being (Friedman, 2008). Although the challenge of determining how we can halt the accelerating pace of energy consumption and stop polluting our world with toxic wastes seems daunting, Friedman (2008) describes the problem of changing the direction of the entire world to more sustainable future as a series of great opportunities disguised as insoluble problems (p. 170). His optimistic view is based on the belief that we simply have no alternative but to transform our thinking and actions, because the human race cannot continue to power its growth and evolution with the same thinking that drove the Industrial Revolution: tremendous use of fossil-based fuels, destruction of the earth's natural resources, the dumping of toxic wastes into the ecosystem, and exploitation of the land.This issue of HERD features articles on the sustainable design of healthcare facilities, and poignant editorial by our guest editor, Robin Guenther, provides insight into the critical nature of this initiative. Sustainability in design is crucial issue, because what we are doing about resource utilization, environmental pollution, and energy consumption is becoming visible and measurable in our communities. We have many opportunities to make difference in energy conservation and the protection of the environment by adopting culture and philosophy of sustainability that meets current needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. A number of healthcare executives have spoken out about the responsibility of the healthcare industry to assume leading role in ensuring healthy environment rather than contribute toxic insults to fragile ecosystems. Embracing culture of sustainability will guide design decisions and influence the selection of materials, finishes, and building methods that ensure that completed project demonstrates eco-accountability.There are many opportunities for innovative practices in with sustainable design and carbon neutral, toxin free, water balanced and zero waste construction (Guenther, 2008, p. 31); we simply need to educate and avail ourselves of the increasing number of products and vendors that also value the concept of going green. Designs for the future must develop energy-efficient systems, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and develop and use such sources of renewable energy as solar, wind, and geothermal whenever possible.Sources of information about sustainable design can be found on the Federal Center Web site (Federal Center on Energy, 2008); in the U.S. Green Building Council Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) program (U.S. Green Building Council, 2008); in Practice Greenhealth (Practice Greenhealth, 2008); in the Green Guide to Health Care (Green Guide to Health Care, 2008); in the Toxic Use Reduction Institute (2008); and in Energy Star (Energy Star, 2007). To ensure the joint optimization (a process described by Hamilton, Orr, and Raboin, 2008) of the sustainability culture and design, it is necessary to articulate clearly the philosophy and value of going green, identify champions of the culture, establish team, identify designers and contractors who can embrace and partner with you in this belief, and contract with green suppliers in the purchase of environmentally safe and energy-efficient products and materials. …

The new comprehensive acoustical criteria for healthcare facilities.

New comprehensive acoustical guidelines for healthcare facilities were drafted for the American Institute of Architects and the American Hospital Association in 2005–6 by the 500‐member TC‐AA.NS.SC (Speech Privacy & Healthcare Acoustics) which is chaired by Gregory Tocci, David Sykes, and William Cavanaugh. Following two rounds of public review, these guidelines were approved for use by the Green Guide for Healthcare in 2007 and in early 2009 they were issued as the sole “Reference Standard” for two new LEED “Indoor Environmental Quality” credits. In early 2010, following two additional rounds of public review, the same guidelines will be released by the Facility Guidelines Institute and the American Society of Healthcare Architects (a division of the American Hospital Association) in the authoritative, code‐level document, “FGI/ASHE Guidelines for the Design and Construction of Hospitals and Healthcare Facilities.” Practitioners and researchers need to be aware of these criteria when designing acoustical solutions for healthcare facilities. This paper will present an overview of the guidelines. The speaker is co‐chairman of the technical committee responsible for drafting the criteria and of ANSI S12 WG44, which is currently developing an additional new healthcare acoustics standard.

Updated American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers Guidelines and Standards on Sustainable Systems Design.

Many designers look for guidance with the various standards targeting sustainable, green buildings. The American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air‐Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) publishes a number of useful design resources related to green buildings. The resources are widely used among mechanical systems engineers and facilities designers. This talk will present an overview of several ASHRAE resources which include acoustics aspects. “ASHRAE Green Guide: The Design, Construction and Operation of Sustainable Buildings” is a book to teach designers how to effectively participate on green building design teams and fundamental green design concepts. The book takes an integrated building systems perspective by addressing how engineered systems interact with and are influenced by architectural design. It also includes guidance on the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED® rating system. ASHRAE is also in the final stages of preparing a new Standard for High‐Performance Green Buildings (Standard 189.1). This Standard is co‐sponsored by the U.S. Green Building Council. Standard 189.1 is being written as an ANSI‐level Standard and intended for adoption into state and local building codes.

Integrated Design is Green

Abstract Good design is sustainable. A truly sustainable project is well designed and is a desirable building. Early discipline integration is a key element of an integrated, holistic design process and results from core design values. Merging a passion for design excellence with values of site sensitivity, resource efficiency, energy-saving technologies, and conscientious material use involves each member of the project team. This approach produces quality design that goes beyond prescriptive sustainable design guide requirements. The topics discussed in this article draw upon experience from a selection of more than twenty projects totaling over six million square feet, including projects that are LEED® registered and certified, including projects pursuing gold certification, following Minnesota's Sustainable Building Guide (B3) and following Green Guide for Health Care™ (GGHC). Project types drawn upon for this article include office buildings, hospitals, laboratories, museums, multi-family housing, ed...

Green hospitals: Acoustical challenges and opportunities.

The United States Green Building Council and Green Guide for Healthcare have each adopted portions of the new American Institute of Architects (AIA) Interim Sound and Vibration Design Guidelines as the Reference Standard as points for their rating system. This paper gives a brief overview of the AIA guidelines, how they are addressed by these two leading sustainability rating systems, and how they impact the design of future healthcare facilities. Sustainable practices are changing to include acoustics and vibration design. However, even the best intent has some of its own challenges. How will healthcare facility design benefit from these design changes to include sound and vibration and what are the potential pitfalls?