Kaiser Permanente will put solar power systems in 15 healthcare facilities across California by the summer of 2011.
According to Kaiser Senior Vice President Raymond J. Baxter, the agreement launches one of the largest sustainable energy programs in U.S. healthcare.
Baxter said installing solar panels on Kaiser Permanente hospitals, medical offices and other buildings is the first part of a larger plan to use onsite renewable energy sources to power Kaiser Permanente's buildings nationwide.
Kaiser Permanente's investment in solar power is intended to reduce the organization's reliance on the public power grid and help it diversify its power sources, Baxter said. The 15 megawatts of solar power will provide part of the electricity needed to run the buildings at the sites, which include Vallejo and Santa Clara medical centers in northern California and Fontana and San Diego medical centers in southern California.
The solar power systems will, upon completion, produce an average of 10 percent of the power Kaiser Permanente uses at these sites, equivalent to electricity used by about 1,900 homes a year.
Kaiser Permanente agreed to purchase the solar power through power purchase agreements with San Francisco-based Recurrent Energy, which will own and operate all of the solar power systems. Citigroup, an equity investor on a portion of the projects, was a partner in structuring the agreements between Kaiser Permanente and Recurrent Energy.
The agreements allow the Oakland-based not-for-profit health plan and hospital system to partner with a private entity that is eligible for a 30 percent tax credit available to private companies such as Recurrent Energy. Kaiser Permanente also retain all the renewable energy credits awarded for the solar projects.
"These solar power systems reaffirm the demand for distributed-scale projects, which can be aggregated together to generate a significant amount of power," said Arno Harris, CEO of Recurrent Energy.
John Kouletsis, director of strategy, planning and design for Kaiser Permanente's national facilities services group, said the energy-saving infrastructure allows Kaiser Permanente to build green and stay on budget.
"These solar agreements are a major step toward the goal of including a wide array of renewable sources in our energy portfolio," he said. In the future, he said, energy sources could include thermal energy, wind and fuel cells in addition to solar.
Kouletsis said the green building efforts would save Kaiser Permanente more than $10 million per year through energy conservation strategies. The organization intends to use sustainable design and construction practices to complete roughly 6.7 million square feet of new construction in the next seven years.