Since past one year as Chairman CII Healthcare Sub-Committee for Western Region, I have been involved in championing the cause of Green Hospitals and undertook a survey of 25 hospitals to gauge their energy utilization patterns. The effort culminated in a report jointly prepared by Schneider  Electric, Fortis Hospitals and CII, which gave some interesting insights clearly indicating that hospitals have a long way to go to become energy efficient. There are only three hospitals in India which are rated as green; two by IGBC LEED (Kohinoor Hospital rated as Platinum and Max Hospital rated as Gold) and the third one (Fortis Hospital at Shalimar Bagh, Delhi) is rated as three star by by GRIHA. India currently has these two rating agencies for getting accreditation as green building. There are almost a dozen hospitals in the pipeline for getting evaluated for a green rating. The ministry of health has also taken up the cause and has started to make it mandatory for large public hospitals to adopt greener technologies. Yesterday in our meeting at CII, it was interesting to note that the Platinum rated Kohinoor Hospital in Mumbai has very low energy costs (almost 50%) as compared to other centrally air-conditoned hospitals in Mumbai of similar size. We will be taking up the issue of green hospitals this year too and would lobby with IGBC to come up with a separate chapter for Green Hospitals. This will help us get focused attention towards the cause. It was interesting to know the “Sick Building Syndrome” which can actually make patients more sick if the air quality is not  good and has higher CO2 content and increase their length of stay. Green hospitals would detect this and hyperventilate the building by pushing in more fresh air through the air-conditioning system to correct the air quality. These were quite interesting facts and am sure we will get more wiser as we travel this pathof greening the healthcare facilities in India.