Health Care
The Green Ribbon Commission’s Health Care Working Group (HCWG) convenes Greater Boston’s leading hospitals, health systems, and health care organizations to advance climate action across the sector.
Health care institutions are on the front lines of climate change. They must reduce emissions from complex, energy-intensive facilities while preparing for disruptions that affect patients, staff, the communities they serve and their own operations. The HCWG supports this work by sharing information, providing technical resources, and creating opportunities for collaboration and policy engagement.
The group helps members connect decarbonization with their core mission: protecting health. By reducing greenhouse gas emissions, addressing facility and community vulnerabilities, and elevating the health benefits of climate action, Boston’s health care leaders can strengthen resilience, advance environmental justice, and use their trusted voice to support effective climate policy.
The HCWG also works to track sector progress and identify shared priorities for action at the city and state levels. Together, its members are helping demonstrate how climate leadership can improve health outcomes, strengthen institutions, and build more resilient communities.
Current Initiatives
A report published in December 2024 by Health Care Without Harm on behalf of the Boston Green Ribbon Commission Healthcare Working Group finds that, even as the Boston area’s health care sector grappled with massive disruption in recent years, hospitals maintained their progress around reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The HCWG will build on this base and:
- Proactively engage Boston’s health care community to support the implementation of BERDO 2.0 with an emphasis on advancing health equity and community resilience.
- Support the development of strategies to further reduce Boston’s health care sector emissions, including pathways towards decarbonizing our supply chains and steam production.
- Connect with other GRC working groups to share institutional best practices on resilience measures and develop cross-institutional collaborations for community resilience.
- Collaborate with the City of Boston on their Climate Action Plan and leverage health research and expertise to support decarbonization and grid modernization efforts.
- Educate state legislators and regulators with subject matter expertise on the health benefits of emissions reductions, and on policies, programs, and investment opportunities that support health care decarbonization.
Participating Organizations
Mass General Brigham | Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center | Beth Israel Lahey Health | Boston Children’s Hospital | Boston Medical Center | Brigham & Women’s Hospital | Dana Farber Cancer Institute | Vertex Pharmaceuticals | Blue Cross Blue Shield Massachusetts
Contact
The Health Care Working Group is co-managed by Dr. Elizabeth Pinsky, Associate Director (Advocacy) at MGH’s Center for Environment and Health.
The key staff contact for this working group is Rebecca Herst at rebecca@greenribboncommission.org.
