Green building guidelines for emergency facilities

Hyderabad: CII-Indian Green Building Council (IGBC) has launched 'Green Guidelines for Fast Track and Emergency Facilities' for treating COVID-19 patients

The Covid pandemic has taken the country by storm, affecting the lives and livelihood of people. There are several temporary facilities being established in the country to cater to the growing affected population. These makeshift arrangements deserve as much attention to detailing as any other healthcare facility. Besides medical needs, these facilities face the challenge of resources conservation, optimisation and more importantly infection control.

IGBC has formed a task force to develop the guidelines which included various healthcare experts across the country under the leadership of Prof Dr R Chandrashekhar. The Task Force members include: Dr Rajiv Kumar Jain, Chief Consultant, Indian Railways; Dr Shakti Gupta, Med Suptd, Dr RP centre, AIIMS-New Delhi; Gautham Baliga, Chair, healthcare technical group, ISHRAE; Jit Kumar Gupta, Chair, IGBC Chandigarh Chapter & Chief Town Planner, SPCL; Dr Vishavdeep Goyal, COO and Unit Head, Apollo Hospitals, Ahmedabad; Ar Hiten Sethi, founder, Hiten Sethi Architects, Mumbai; Chitranjan Kaushik, COO, Ecofirst Services Limited, Mumbai.

As part of the launch session, V Suresh, the Chairman of IGBC, indicated that these guidelines will add immense value and guidance to all central, state and local government and healthcare organisations, while designing the fast-track and emergency facilities for treating COVID-19 patients and also addressing the sustainable infrastructure and various infection control measures.

The facilities include 3-tier approach for quarantine, isolation and critical care needs. CII established the Indian Green Building Council (IGBC) in 2001 to strengthen the sustainability aspects and to sensitise various forms of built environment. Over the last two decades, IGBC has been instrumental in enabling 7.55 billion sqft of green buildings and green built environment in the country.

Gurmit Singh Arora, Vice-Chair, IGBC, congratulated the task force members and IGBC team for developing the guidelines for COVID facilities which is need of the hour. Prof Dr R Chandrashekhar, Chairman, Task Force, emphasised the importance of layout design, infection control and ventilation parameters in the COVID facilities. These are applicable to new, existing converted COVID facilities and modular facility.

The major focus is on site selection for greenfield facility, layout, modular/mobile structures for fast-track/ emergency facilities, hygiene practices, ventilation parameters, infection control, energy efficiency, water conservation, waste management, interior furnishings and facilities for healthcare workforce.