Sustainability metrics and awards

For 20 years, the Environmental Excellence Awards have recognized the U.S. health care sector’s top performers in sustainability. This program enables Practice Greenhealth to gather sustainability data nationwide, identify leaders, and empower health care facilities to continually improve their sustainability efforts. Participating facilities can compare their sustainability data with peers, share successes and best practices, and validate their work to contribute to the national health care sustainability movement. Facilities new to sustainability can use the application as a guide, finding inspiration for their own steps.

More than 350 participating hospitals

#1 source of hospital sustainability data in the world

Nearly 6,000 awards presented

2024 Applicant Distribution

Because climate change is the single greatest threat to public health, Practice Greenhealth and Health Care Without Harm are adjusting the 2025 Environmental Excellence Awards to focus on reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Our industry must meet the science-based targets of a 50% reduction in all emissions by 2030 and achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. As the sector’s premier recognition program for sustainability performance, we aim to use this program to measure, drive, and reward action toward the decarbonization of our industry.

In 2024, Practice Greenhealth and Health Care Without Harm published their first strategic plan, which set climate mitigation, resilience, and equity as our strategic priorities, with a zero-emissions, climate-resilient, and equitable health sector as our North Star. As standards like the Greenhouse Gas Protocol and pathways to zero emissions for the health care sector have become clearer, we have reframed the Environmental Excellence Awards to focus heavily on reducing GHG emissions.

Specific implications for the 2025 awards season

To be considered for a Partner Recognition award in 2025, you only need to submit the profile and climate pages of the application. The profile page includes important demographic information about your facility, while the climate page requires you to calculate and submit your complete Scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions and at least one category of your Scope 3 emissions. All other program pages (leadership, waste, chemicals, food, etc.) are optional

Submitting your GHG emissions

For 2025, you have two options for submitting your GHG emissions:

1. Let the awards application calculate your GHG emissions. This guide (PDF) details which sections of specific pages must be completed for the calculation.
2. Calculate your GHG emissions independently and input your MTCO2e values into the climate page, along with a backup report. You may use your own numbers as long as your methodology follows the Greenhouse Gas Protocol. Alternatively, you can use the Health Care Emissions Impact Calculator.

Increasing transparency for recognition

Facilities applying for the Partner for Change and Emerald awards must submit more than just the profile and climate pages. The Partner for Change award requires the submission of at least five additional program pages and evidence of clear and intentional sustainability programs. The Emerald Award will still go to the top 20% of applications, but will now require a minimum of eight additional program pages.

The Top 25 awards have traditionally recognized the highest-scoring and highest-performing facilities, using markers like percent regulated medical waste, water use per square foot, and percent renewable energy as indicators of high performance. This will remain the same for 2025, with the Top 25 awarded to the facilities with the most overall points.

However, starting with the 2026 awards cycle, we will use GHG emissions reduction as the primary indicator of high performance. Therefore, in 2026, only the Profile and Climate pages will be required to be considered for a Top 25 award.

The Circle of Excellence Award will continue to be awarded to the top ten scoring programs in each category (Chemicals, Food, Sustainable procurement, Transportation, etc.) To be considered for a Circle of Excellence Award, a facility needs only to submit the applicable program page along with the required Profile and Climate pages.

With the refocusing of the Environmental Excellence Awards on climate change mitigation, we will no longer offer the Greening the OR application as a stand-alone option. Facilities interested in pursuing Greening the OR work are encouraged to submit the Partner for Change application and can choose to submit only the Profile, Climate, and Greening the OR pages. Additionally, we will no longer offer the Greening the OR Recognition Award as we concentrate the awards on mobilizing our partners against climate change.

Historically, the Environmental Excellence Awards application has been divided into 11 sustainability impact areas, one of which is climate. The remaining 10 program pages provide a detailed and comprehensive list of actions you can take at your facility to reduce the environmental impact of your operations. By building robust sustainability programs in these 10 areas, you will reduce your GHG emissions, remove toxic chemicals from your care environments, conserve precious resources like water, and minimize unnecessary waste generated by your operations. These program pages will continue to be a crucial part of the Environmental Excellence Awards, and we will keep updating them with best practices and innovative ideas to drive the industry toward more sustainable health care delivery.

Additionally, if filling out the entire application is a valuable data-gathering initiative for your team, we encourage you to continue using the application as you always have. If you prefer to answer only certain questions on some of the pages to track your progress on metrics year over year, you are welcome to do so. Data entered on an unscored page will still be included in the benchmark and trend reports.

While climate resilience and equity are equally important strategic priorities, the health sector needs better and more consistent metrics for measuring and benchmarking these critical aspects of climate action. Currently, resilience and equity questions are embedded throughout the application’s content-area pages. As Practice Greenhealth and Health Care Without Harm, along with the broader health care sector, build more refined metrics and standards for climate resilience and equity, we will update the application to reflect them.