The federal government says it’s spending up to $1 million from the Low Carbon Economy Fund to support the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario’s (CHEO) Deep Energy Retrofit Program, which includes installing a new energy recovery system and re-engineering the hospital’s heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems. The project also introduces two new heat pumps to reduce energy consumption from natural gas-fired boilers. The government says the changes will satisfy the hospital’s heating requirements and recover and reuse heat waste, improving efficiency and reducing emissions.

In an average year, CHEO emits over 6,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions. With these upgrades in place, the hospital will be able to reduce its overall greenhouse gas emissions by over 2,500 tonnes per year, the equivalent of approximately 600 homes’ energy use for one year, the government says.

“By working with organizations across Canada such as the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario, we are making operating costs more affordable and growing the economy all while fighting climate change,” says Adam van Koeverden, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change. “Through the Low Carbon Economy Fund, the Government of Canada is partnering with climate leaders nationwide to cut emissions, so that our children and grandchildren will have cleaner air to breathe. Helping hospitals make these changes just makes good public health sense.”

The Low Carbon Economy Fund is part of the government’s plan to put Canada on a path to achieving net-zero emissions by 2050.