The catalyst for the design and construction of Hackensack University Medical Center’s new Central Utility Plant, a 45,000 s.f., standalone facility that centralizes and consolidates the hospital complex’s existing energy infrastructure, stemmed from the Hackensack Meridian Health network’s desire to expand the acute care services they offer patients, improve the capacity and efficiency of their thermal and electrical utilities, and safeguard the hospital’s mission-critical healthcare services from a potential outage.
RSC Architects worked collaboratively and meticulously alongside the project team, plant operations, and hospital staff to design the new facility, coordinate and phase shut-downs, and relocate and commission the equipment within the new plant – all while keeping the hospital fully operational.
The new Central Utility Plant now includes a 180,000-pound-per-hour boiler plant, a 12,000-ton chiller plant, and a 7,500-kilowatt diesel generator plant. Its hybrid electric and steam-powered chiller plant includes redundant equipment, as well as the ability to support 50% of the site’s peak cooling load in the event of an emergency, such as the loss of the electrical grid. In addition, the plant includes emergency electrical connections in order to support more than 90% of the peak cooling.
This project has achieved the USGBC’s new PEER (Performance Excellence Electricity Renewal) Gold certification, which recognizes industry leaders in energy efficient design – one of the first three medical centers to receive PEER certification, the first nationwide to certify at the Gold level, and the first PEER-certified project in New Jersey.
