Anesthetic agents are an essential part of general anesthesia for patients during surgery, but they contain a greenhouse gas that depletes the ozone layer. It’s estimated that 8.5% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions come from the healthcare sector, including those emitted by hospitals and surgery centers during patient surgeries that require anesthesia. During surgery, a patient inhales volatile anesthetic agents that have been converted from a liquid to a gas via a vaporizer that is part of the anesthesia delivery machine.
“Very often, when a patient goes under general anesthesia in the operation room, volatile anesthetic agents are used,” says Mike Jones, program manager at GE Healthcare’s Madison, Wisconsin, site. He is leading an innovative project to develop a new vaporization technology that doesn’t require volatile anesthetic agents for calibration and, consequently, will result in lower greenhouse gas emissions.
The project, which is anticipated to be completed in 2024 or 2025, is expected to have a significant impact on Madison’s carbon footprint.
Working to Reduce Greenhouse Gases
GE Healthcare is committed to reducing the company’s emissions to help curb global warming. In November, the company signed on to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Health Sector Climate Pledge, reaffirming its commitment to reduce its emissions by 50% by 2030 and achieve net zero by 2050. Numerous projects are being implemented at GE Healthcare sites worldwide, notably the project in Madison.
In 2019, GE Healthcare performed baseline assessments of its carbon footprint and used a third-party agency specializing in sustainability projects to identify opportunities. The team then used the information to create a road map to help them meet their goals.
“It is a fantastic commitment by the organization to place such a high value on the environment and drive it down throughout the organizations to all the operating sites,” says Chad Pierce, senior environment, health and safety manager of GE Healthcare’s Madison site. “To continue on the path that the world is going down, global warming is just going to continue to get worse. We have to take action.”
GE Healthcare also committed to the Science Based Targets initiative, an international partnership of organizations that are dedicated to reducing carbon emissions by 50% by 2030 and keeping the global temperature from rising more than 1.5 degrees Celsius, to avoid catastrophic climate change.
Taking Advantage of Cooler Weather
At Madison, one of the opportunities identified to reduce the facility’s carbon footprint was updating some of the cooling systems on-site. A team presented their idea to leadership — in a format similar to the “Shark Tank” TV show — for a chiller optimization project and were awarded funding to complete the project.
The funding enabled employees to upgrade the Madison site’s comfort cooling systems and air-handling units. The project, which was completed in October 2021, allows the site to shut down its chillers during cooler weather, relying on the air units to bring colder temperatures indoors. It reduces the site’s carbon footprint by 1,100 metric tons per year, or 11.8% of the site’s footprint.
“It’s essentially taking a fleet of 255 cars off the road for one year, driving just under 3 million miles,” Pierce says.
GE Healthcare’s site in Madison, Wisconsin.
Reducing the Release of Greenhouse Gases
Vaporization is a critical process in delivering general anesthesia, as it takes the anesthetic agent and literally turns it into a vapor so it can be delivered as a gas to the patient during a surgery.
Many vaporizers in this field require the use of additional anesthetic agent for calibration and tests, and the process contributes to the release of greenhouse gases. However, this project will offer an alternative manufacturing method that doesn’t require the extra anesthetic agent during production.
“With the new vaporization technology, we can use an alternative gas that’s more greenhouse friendly for calibration and testing purposes,” Jones says.
Currently, 46% of the Madison site’s carbon footprint comes from the manufacture of anesthetic agents via vaporizers. The team hopes, through the new technology, to reduce that carbon footprint by more than 30%.
“It is equivalent to removing 713 cars from the road for a year [driving] 8.2 million miles,” Pierce says, comparing the effort with the earlier chiller project results. “Desflurane — that’s the anesthetic agent that we will be eliminating — has a global-warming potential of 2,540; carbon dioxide is a 1. So the global-warming potential for desflurane is astronomical compared with the other anesthetic agents that are used out there. And to replace the anesthetic agent with an environmentally friendly alternative, that’s where the reduction comes into play.”
Many GE Healthcare manufacturing sites are taking similar actions across the world to reduce their carbon footprint. “It’s exciting to be able to develop new technology that not only is helping doctors and patients but also helping the planet,” comments Jones.
