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A hospital in Wales found a way to keep the planet and its patients well with solar power.
The first UK hospital to have its own solar farm is Morriston Hospital in Swansea. The initiative is off to an excellent start. Welsh governmentMonday, announced. In addition to contributing to the hospital’s daily electricity needs, the farm managed to cover 100 percent of its demand for a period of 50 hours.
“I am delighted that the solar farm’s performance has already exceeded our initial expectations,” chair of Swansea University Health Board Emma Woollett said in the announcement.
The farm first went live in November and has since saved the hospital around £120,000 in electricity bills. It has also generated an additional 30,000 kilowatts of energy which the hospital was then able to sell back into the grid for a profit. This is particularly impressive since the farm has so far only been running during the shortest days of the year and isn’t even completely finished.
“It was expected that over the winter months the solar farm would contribute electricity, but that the hospital would still need to continue to buy power from the grid every day,” Swansea Bay University health board assistant director of operations Des KeighanThe Guardian. “What has come as a pleasant surprise is that for a total of 50 hours, the hospital has been entirely powered by the solar farm. This is despite the fact that the solar farm hasn’t been operating continually over the winter. It is still under testing and fine-tuning and is not expected to be completed until the end March. So this additional performance has been even more of a bonus.”
The loan was provided by the Welsh government to finance the project. Its purpose was to make the public sector carbon-free by 2030. The four megawatt facility is located on Brynwhillach Farm. The hospital is connected by a three-kilometer (approximately 2.2 mile) wire.
“We want our energy to come from community owned and locally run renewable energy sources in Wales,” Welsh Minister for Climate Change Julie James said during a visit to the site. “This will ensure our supply is resilient, reliable and reasonable for both our planet and our pockets. We have ambitious ambitions to decarbonize the public sector by 2030. Morriston Hospital — which depend not only on the powers of their staff, but also the Energie hungry machines to keep their patients alive and well – have blazed the trail in their switch to renewables, which makes sense both financially and to the health of the people of Wales.”
The farm’s success comes at a crucial moment for energyAs high as the UK and worldwide. Oil and Gas prices climbed even higher after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as The National pointed out.
The farm cost an initial £5.7 million and was initially projected to save £500,000 in bills every year and 1,000 tonnes (approximately 1,102 U.S. tons) once fully operational. The Guardian reported that the hospital now expects to save almost twice the original estimate due to the increase in global energy prices.
“With the current volatile situation with energy prices, this really shows that the investment and the long-term thinking on behalf of the health board has paid off,” Woollett said in the announcement.
The farm’s success also arrives at a crucial moment for the fight against the Climate crisis. The latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change(IPCC), report last month, warned that urgent action must be taken to reduce greenhouse gas emission or the climate will alter beyond our ability to adapt.
“Our addiction to fossil fuels is proving harmful, volatile and no longer viable,” James said in the announcement. “In Wales we will continue to accelerate our investment in renewable energy and energy efficient measures such as those adopted at Morriston hospital, and call on the UK Government to support a socially just transition to Net Zero as we respond to the climate emergency. The IPCC have rung the clarion call for our planet, now we must listen and respond to the science.”
