Cost

$25,000,000

Southwest Virginia Medical Center is a new full service replacement hospital located in Emporia Virginia for Community Health Systems. The existing building was old and in need of many updates as well as additional square footage. An approximately 130,000 square foot full replacement hospital is being built to replace the existing facility. The new hospital is an 80 bed facility consisting of surgical suite, diagnostic imaging, full lab services, as well as dining facilities.

This building is being designed in conjunction with Johnson Controls Inc. and maximizing energy savings is paramount. The existing facility currently does not operate with natural gas and therefore we have worked extensively with the city officials to bring gas to this site.

In addition, the mechanical design was based on seven variable air volume air-handling units and one constant volume air-handling unit serving the surgery suite. These units were designed based on time schedules within the hospital and therefore can be reduced in off peak times to maximize energy savings. The cooling system consisted of (2) 350 ton water cooled chillers with an outdoor cooling tower. The chilled water pumps are provided with variable frequency drives. The heating system consists of (2) 200 HP steam boilers connected with heating hot water and domestic water heat exchangers. An above ground 10,000 gallon fuel oil storage tank is provided for an auxiliary heating source. The electrical service to the facility is a 3000A, 480 volt normal power service distributed to panels and transformers throughout the facility. One 650 KW generator was provided for emergency distribution. Other systems such as medical gas, nurse call, physiological monitoring, fetal monitoring, data/voice, etc. were designed throughout the facility.