Hospisol

HOSPISOL Programme
Castilla y León

PROJECT TEAM & PARTNERS

 EREN (Ente Regional de la Energía de Castilla y León).

 SACyL (Health Service of Health Regional Minister of Castilla y León)

TOTAL BUDGET

 €4.5m

 Public Funding - Castilla y León Regional Minister of Economy and Regional minister of Health.

CONTRACT LENGTH

5 years

DESCRIPTION OF THE PROJECT

Hospisol is a programme, part of the "Castilla y León Solar Energy Plan", carrying out the promotion of Solar Thermal Energy benefits through promoting installations in public hospitals.
Castilla y León has established a strategy of turning their Hospitals into buildings with a respect for sustaining the environment.
The objective of the project is to implement solar thermal energy installations in public hospitals in Castilla y León.. From the 23 public hospitals in the region, after a feasibility study, 16 hospitals were detected as having potential for carrying solar thermal installations.
The initial estimations for the programme indicate that 9,000m2 of solar thermal surface would be needed to cover 60 % of the annual demand for domestic hot water production in regional hospitals, affecting a total of 7,000 beds.
The technical support of the HOSPISOL Programme is complemented wby the creation of a Solar Thermal Energy Guideline, which has been added to the technical bidding conditions in the general Mechanical Installations Guidelines for new Hospitals.
Additionally, an energy intranet was developed to support the data arising from the management and monitoring of the hospital's energy consumption.
Until now the 13 Solar Thermal installations implemented in regional hospitals have contributed an annual average of 450 kWh/year/m2 of energy production, and an economic saving of 39.5 €/year/m2 of installed solar thermal collector/panel.

CHALLENGES FACED

1. Lack of knowledge experienced by the Hospital's maintenance workers, who in order to compensate had to receive a training session regarding the operation of the solar thermal installations, during the HOSPISOL programme execution.

2. Updating the assigned budget every year of the project.

3. The internal coordination with EREN and the Health Service of Health Regional Minister of Castilla y León whilst planning for new building or re-building Hospitals.

INNOVATIVE PRACTICE

The innovative model of management in HOSPISOL is based on the "energy supply" model. That means EREN analyses the projects, carries on and maintains the solar installations, whilst Hospitals turn over part of the generated energy by their own solar installations.
The Hospital pays EREN the consumption of energy with a reduction of 10 % depending on the cost of the conventional used fuel in every building, therby reimbursing EREN its initial investment.
The price of the fuel is updated according to the cost of fuel acquisition by the Hospital. Once EREN pays off its investment, the solar plant is owned by the Hospital. That's when the Hospital starts getting the whole benefit from the installation (until the end of its working life), together with the associated benefit generated from saving energy.
It should be noted that training for the maintenance personnel of the hospitals is also included in the management of the installation.

PROJECT TARGETS

Carrying out the solar thermal energy installations in public Hospitals of the region:
From a total of 23 only 16 were interested in installing solar thermal energy and 13 installations have been completed..
Assuming the role of technical support in solar energy issues for the Health Regional Minister:
Disseminating this kind of technology, showing HOSPISOL as an example of best practice in the region:

LESSONS LEARNT & APPLICABILITY IN OTHER SITUATIONS

The system of applications designed by HOSPISOL can be potentially replicated in any kind of public buildings with certain adaptations and integrating them into an exclusive Net of Solar Thermal Installations like in Castilla y León.
Buildings like hospitals were chosen for carrying out solar thermal installations took place because hospitals of their high levels of domestic hot water consumption which is quite constant along the whole year. Other parameters were their excellent access for the sun as well as large and accessible roofs for the installations of solar collectors. The latter was thought to be a good showcase for the solar technology, especially since hospitals are places characterised by high flows on a daily basis.
Finally this forms a good example of the support to solar technology from the Regional Government.

OTHER RELEVANT INFORMATION
• The exhibition of Solar thermal installation posters in the lobbies of the hospitals, will show employees, patients and visitors that the Hospital uses Solar Thermal Energy.
• The dissemination of a publication with information of the HOSPISOL Programme with details of every solar installation.
• The publication's contents are expected to be updated and extended with new solar installations through to the end of the programme. The objective of this publication is to create an easy approach for programme replication in other public institutions. This document will be also available from the EREN website together with updated data on the installations parameters.
• The HOSPISOL Programme has been advertised in other regions of Spain by those interested to replicate it in their regions. One of the presentations took place during the Spanish Sustainable Energy Week in Murcia.


CONCLUSIONS
The HOSPISOL Programme emerged in order to cover the necessity in legislation, training and dissemination of solar energy, with the regional Government setting the example. Another positive result has been the fact that installing solar thermal systems in buildings like hospitals has been considered a good way of showcasing solar thermal technology to the high flow of people accessing them every day.

CONTACT DETAILS
Jorge Jové Sandoval
Chief of the Solar Energy Area in EREN
Tel: •+34 987-84.07.50
E-mail: jovsanjo@jcyl.es

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