The Green Electronics Council recognizes the sole health-care system to win an award for its commitment to purchasing environmentally preferable electronics.
PORTLAND, Oregon – May 14, 2015 – The Green Electronics Council today announced during CleanMed that Kaiser Permanente is the first health-care system to win an EPEAT Purchaser Award.
The EPEAT Purchaser Awards recognize excellence in the procurement of environmentally preferable electronics. In addition, Kaiser Permanente is one of the nation’s leading health care providers and not-for-profit health plans. For it earned an award for also buying laptops. Moreover desktops, tablets, monitors, printers and multifunction devices. Those registered in the EPEAT rating system.
Thousands of purchasers worldwide have used EPEAT for more than eight years. All to select greener electronic products. Thereby achieving significant environmental benefits. For example, the lifecycle environmental benefit
[1] of Kaiser Permanente’s purchase of EPEAT-registered products in 2014 will:
- Deliver an estimated $7.9 million in cost savings from energy efficiency
- Eliminate mercury use equivalent to more than 1,900 mercury fever thermometers
- Reduce solid waste by nearly 750 metric tons, equivalent to 400 U.S. households’ annual waste generation
- Prevent the release of nearly 8,500 metric tons of greenhouse gases, equivalent to removing more than 6,000 passenger cars from the road for a year
Award Recipients
EPEAT Purchaser Award recipients were recognized for their procurement efforts in up to three product categories – PCs and Displays, Imaging Equipment and Televisions – earning a star for each category in which they purchased environmentally preferable electronics. Kaiser Permanente, a two-star winner. One was one of 17 EPEAT Purchaser Award recipients in 2015. It’s a group that also included higher-education and municipal, state and Federal government entities.
Sources: EPEAT, The Green Electronics Council
[1] Results based on comparison with products that do not meet EPEAT environmental criteria, calculated using the U.S. EPA’s Electronics Environmental Benefits Calculator and by multiplying the average lifespan of each product type in the Kaiser system by its annual energy cost savings.
