Leading the Way in Green Healthcare

This week, the NOHC Green Energy Committee introduced its Sustainability Strategy 2026–2030 to staff. We are no strangers to environmental leadership. Since first partnering with the HSE Sustainability Office and the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) in 2021, the Hospital has directed approximately €2 million into sustainability projects, under the Sustainability Strategy 2022-2025, and the results of these investments speak for themselves.

NOHC Sustainability Strategy 2022-2025 Achievements:

• Energy Overhauls: Through hospital-wide LED lighting upgrades, a comprehensive window replacement programme, and the installation of zoning valves and thermostatic controls, we have successfully reduced our Plant Room energy usage by an impressive 42%.
• Carbon and Clinical Milestones: We have also achieved a 26% drop in annual combined gas and electricity usage compared to the 2019 baseline, and in April 2025, the Hospital officially switched off its nitrous oxide supply to further shrink its medical carbon footprint. Furthermore, rooftop Solar PV arrays now generate clean electricity for the Hospital’s use.
• Catering & Waste Management: The catering department has successfully bucked the national trend. While the average HSE hospital produces 730g of food waste per day, NOHC managed to reduce its food waste from 522g in June 2024 to just 240g by December 2025—a massive 54% reduction. This was achieved by introducing, inter alia, small and regular plate sizes, an electronic meal-ordering system, updating ward hot-food trollies, reducing beef menu items by 50%, and offering daily plant-based or vegan options.
• Fostering a Green Culture: NOHC has transformed daily life on campus. All standard paper was replaced with 100% recycled paper; paperless cleaning matrices were deployed, campus-wide recycling trinity bins were rolled out alongside a new 400kg cardboard baler; and a compostable cup surcharge paired with reusable ‘Go Cups’ successfully diverted over 372,000 compostable cups and lids from landfills since 2022. The Hospital’s commuter initiatives even earned the National Transport Authority’s (NTA) Silver Smarter Travel Mark Award, backed by a 40-space bicycle shelter and brand-new shower rooms for staff choosing ‘greener’ and healthier work commutes. And we welcomed our resident native Irish honeybees to the campus grounds. 

Future Ambitions (2026–2030)

The newly launched 2026–2030 strategy acknowledges that the next phase of the journey requires systemic, mandatory transformations to meet the state’s rigid Public Sector Climate Action Requirements. Over the next four years, NOHC’s future ambitions will use data to guide decarbonisation, resource preservation, and compliance:

1. Digitisation-by-Default: In compliance with national public-sector mandates, NOHC is adopting a “digitisation-by-default” policy to eliminate paper entirely from daily clinical and administrative operations wherever practicable.
2. Proactive Water Conservation: NOHC will rapidly expand its utility submetering and automated leak detection capabilities. A primary future objective is the engineering feat of reusing reverse-osmosis reject water wherever feasible.
3. Decarbonisation and Procurement: To support the national 2030 goals, the Hospital will continue to align with strict green procurement standards and national decarbonisation targets, further optimising heating systems toward absolute carbon-zero operational designs. To achieve this ambition, biofuels may be part of the Hospital’s consideration set.
4. Targeting High Energy, Carbon Use and Operational Waste: Laboratories, radiology, and operating theatres are major energy consumers and waste producers. We plan to address these areas with comprehensive measures to lower our environmental footprint.

Engaging and Informing our People

We recognise that the success of the strategy relies on the collective support our staff, and the Hospital is actively appointing “Green Champions” across departments and developing an official Sustainability Training Calendar.

To maintain momentum, we will host two dedicated “Green Days” per annum, codify our environmental mission in a formal “Green Charter,” and consistently share transparent progress metrics on the Green Notice Boards, in the Staff App, and through a dedicated Green Energy Committee Newsletter.

Our efforts to date have shown that public healthcare can pioneer climate action without compromising patient safety or the quality of care, and this strategy ensures we continue to protect our patients, our people, and the planet.