A new, nearly $211 million hospital is now open at Fort Irwin, California.
The new facility is the only carbon-neutral hospital within the Defense Department, according to Col. Martin Doperak, the hospital’s commander.
The building received a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Platinum certification — indicating the building is highly energy-efficient and healthy to live in, Doperak said during a question-and-answer session that was broadcast on Facebook.
There are only three hospitals in the United States with that rating, he added.
The large solar field in front of the hospital helps offset the electricity used by the hospital’s systems, such as the massive amount of air conditioning needed to cool facilities in the California desert, Doperak said.
“The hospital does pull energy from the post [Fort Irwin] at night, but in a 24-hour period it‘s actually going to create more energy than it is going to utilize,” Doperak said.
The hospital is almost 60 percent larger than the current facility, allowing the medical units on Fort Irwin to consolidate in one central location, according to a statement released by the Army. Previously, the units were scattered across 17 different buildings.
The original hospital was built in 1968, Doperak said.
“Over the years, we have upgraded and expanded the current Weed Army Community Hospital. However, it is nearly 50 years old, is undersized for the amount of services we provide, and is inefficient based on modern standards,” he said.
Transferring operations from the old Weed Army Community Hospital to the new facility will take several weeks, Doperak said. The movement is being staggered so that it has as small an impact on patients as possible, he said.
In keeping with the new hospital’s efficiency mission, the old facilities will be demolished, rather than renovated for another purpose, Doperak said.
“The cost in order to renovate the old hospital was just going to be astronomical,” Doperak said. “It was just going to be cost-prohibitive in the end, so the intent is to knock it down.”
Kyle Rempfer was an editor and reporter who has covered combat operations, criminal cases, foreign military assistance and training accidents. Before entering journalism, Kyle served in U.S. Air Force Special Tactics and deployed in 2014 to Paktika Province, Afghanistan, and Baghdad, Iraq.
