New York state has awarded a $1 million grant to NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital to help fund the construction of a clean and efficient cogeneration plant and help lower the hospital's energy costs.

NewYork-Presbyterian is one of only two grant recipients to receive the maximum amount of $1 million, out of 32 grants totaling $15.5 million given to organizations statewide.

The cogeneration plant at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center has an expected completion date of year-end 2006 and a budget of $25 million.

Once operational, the new plant is expected to lower NewYork-Presbyterian's annual energy bill by $5 million and decrease the hospital's exposure to utility-cost volatility.

Cogeneration is a combined heat and power generation system, which provides much greater overall efficiency than traditional generation by converting waste heat from electricity generation into usable energy.

"The hospital does not currently generate any of its own power, except in the event of an outage when we employ our emergency generators. The new cogeneration plant will provide NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell with 100 percent of its base electric requirements and two-thirds of its peak electric requirements," says Robert Volland, the hospital's senior vice president of real estate and facilities. "The benefits of the new plant include additional backup power, greater steam reliability, and substantially less nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide output."

Distributed generation "enables energy users to take control of their energy costs while benefiting the state's environment, economic development and energy security," Gov. George E. Pataki says. "This funding will help reduce costs for energy consumers and enhance the quality of the environment today and for future generations."

The hospital also was recognized this year by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for its energy efficiency accomplishments, including the establishment of a $1.5 million budget for energy efficiency retrofits and energy-saving incentives for hospital employees. NewYork-Presbyterian is currently among the top five percent of electricity consumers in New York City.