Photo: Kidfly182 / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY 4.0
ALBANY, N.Y. – Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Monday that eight New York hospitals will receive a combined nearly $28 million for six energy efficiency and electrification projects. The awards come through the Empire Building Challenge: Hospitals Program, run by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).
The photograph shows Elmhurst Hospital Center in Queens, one of the hospitals receiving funds. It is a 2026 file photo.
The six projects are:
- Long Island Jewish Medical Center, Katz Women’s Hospital (Queens): nearly $4.3 million for a heat recovery chiller and other upgrades.
- NYC Health + Hospitals, Elmhurst Hospital Center (Queens): more than $5 million for new heat pump chillers and controls upgrades.
- SBH Health System, St. Barnabas Hospital (Bronx): more than $5 million to replace a steam chiller plant with an electric one.
- Montefiore’s Wakefield Hospital, Jack D. Weiler Hospital and Westchester Square (Bronx): nearly $4.9 million combined for heat recovery heat pumps to electrify heating.
- Northwell Health, Phelps Memorial Hospital (Sleepy Hollow): more than $5 million for a heat recovery chiller, heat pumps and thermal storage.
- Finger Lakes Health, Geneva General Hospital (Geneva): more than $3.5 million for a new cooling plant and other equipment upgrades.
Six of the eight hospitals are in disadvantaged communities, the governor’s office said. The state projects that, once the work is done, the projects together will cut the hospitals’ annual energy use by more than 213,000 MMBtu, equal to the energy needed to power nearly 2,600 homes, and will save more than 11,000 tons of carbon emissions a year. Those figures are forecasts, not results.
“These awards will help ensure our hospitals continue to provide New Yorkers critical access to medical care while maintaining our commitment to the clean energy transition,” Hochul said. The awards are paid for from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative and the Clean Energy Fund.
Why it matters: lower energy bills free up money for patient care, and the state wants the projects to serve as models other hospitals can copy. Still unknown: when each project will be finished and whether the savings projected by the state will be reached.
JBizNews Desk | Albany, N.Y.
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