Association member UC Davis Health, in Sacramento, Calif., has gained national recognition for its exemplary efforts to ensure sustainability on its campus.
Practice Greenhealth, a leading sustainable health care organization delivering environmental solutions to more than 1,400 hospitals and health systems in the United States and Canada, named UC Davis Health one of the Top 25 Environmental Excellence award winners for the second year in a row in 2023.
Kristina Cullen, MBA, sustainability director at UC Davis Health, says the health system seeks to mitigate sustainability needs through three pillars: social sustainability, economic sustainability, and environmental sustainability.
One of UC Davis Health’s biggest efforts surrounds water use and food waste. The hospital partners with Copia, a tech-enabled food recovery company that collects pre–consumer accessed, edible food overages from the hospital’s retail and patient care operations and delivers it to local nonprofits. Since November 2022, the partnership has saved 18,000 pounds of food, which equals 15,000 meals.
UC Davis Health also partners with California Safe Soil, which takes food scraps deemed unfit for consumption from the UC Davis Health Food and Nutrition Services production kitchen and mechanically breaks them down into liquid form. The liquid then is used to fertilize crops, increasing the crop yields by 20 to 30 percent and reducing water usage and need for pesticides.
Additionally, in partnership with Stryker, a medical technologies corporation, UC Davis Health has reduced the number of single-use devices used in operating rooms later disposed in landfills by reprocessing them. In 2022, the partnership diverted an estimated 28,000 pounds, at a cost avoidance of more than $6,000.
The hospital also received a 2022 Climate Champion award from Health Care Without Harm, which recognizes the health system’s commitment to reducing its carbon footprint.
To learn more about climate initiatives at essential hospitals, or share a program of your own, visit EssentialCommunities.org.
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