The San Diego VA Medical Center receives the ENERGY STAR in 2011( the second year in a row) with the assistance of Lee Stevens. With the changes in benchmarking hospitals occurring in November 2011, the Medical Center worked very closely with ETA to ensure the integrity of all records pre-modification of the Portfolio Manager tool. The entire Engineering , Energy and Electrical  teams at the San Diego VA Medical Center contributed to this major accomplishment. 

Hospitals_in_California_that_received_the_ENERGY_STAR_in_2011.docx 

The Medical Center's investment in a highly effective Combined Heat & Power System that not only delivers higher efficiency for the Central Plant but can be controlled to reduce demand the grid during peak hours of the day. The facility is completing an assessment of Advanced Lighting Control Technologies under a project managed by ETA. The results of the study will be published on the Emerging Technologies Coordinating Council website in 2012. ( please refer to www.etcc-ca.com) for publication of this report. The assessment is innovative and will include a staged approach to the assessment of individual control devices within any advanced lighting control system. 

Heretofore, most advanced lighting control system projects measured all control devices at the same time; it was difficult to assess the effectiveness of  a system device by device vs the whole system. Segregating the performance of devices within a lighting control system allows you to quantify the energy savings and also select which devices are needed during the design phase of the system. Lessons were learned by all stakeholders during this two year assessment project. 

The VA San Diego Medical Center gave tremendous feedback throughout the process:occupants, electrical , engineering , interior design and IT were among a few of the teams that gave input to the Energy Management project manager and task force for the VA facility.