The County of South Jutland has 23 county authorities and a population of 254 000. The provision of hospital and health services is the county’s heaviest task in terms of expenditure. The expenditure of 280 million euro’s accounts for 61% of the county’s operational expenditure. The County provides free treatment to its citizens in its own hospitals outside the region and has 4 somatic hospitals. In total the hospitals discharge 50 000 patients and treat 150 000 out-patients on a yearly basis. The hospitals in South Jutland have more than 1 000 beds all together.

Esbensen, Consulting Engineers dates 50 years back. Consultancy within Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning HVAC is the traditional working field of the c ompany. Through the last 15 years a special expertise has been developed within the areas of indoor climate, energy efficient building design and new energy technologies. Totally 30 engineers and technicians are employed in the three offices in Copenhagen, Sønderborg and Aabenraa.

The hospital was opened in 1975 and serves patients from the region of Schleswig in the Northern part of Germany. The goal was to reduce the length of time patients with various abuse-problems should stay in hospitals from months to weeks. The hospital is famous for its ecological use of building materials in order to take care of sensitive patients with allergic or psychical problems. The hospital is specialised in psychiatry, psychosomatic (including all kind of addictions) and environmental medicine. It has 120 beds. The new building will double the capacity of the hospital and will make it possible to offer different structures for the patients and the employees. Furthermore, it will allow more advanced researches to take place.

Meyer Hospital in Florence is the oldest children hospital in Italy. Founded in 1884 with a donation from Giovanni Meyer in memory of his wife Anna. The hospital is c urrently initiating a major development project, which will see the transfer of all its activities to a new building, which, once complete, will be at the forefront of technology and architecture. Each year Meyer treats 10 000 in-patients and 20 000 outpatients. 77% of the children come from Florence and Tuscany, 17% from other regions of Italy, and 6% from abroad. Many children arrive from Balkan counties, which is why the hospital also provides treatment and accommodation for the patients' family. All of this is made possible by generous donations of the Hospital’s supporters.

The Torun City Hospital is self-governing public health care institution belonging to the Municipality of Torun. The main responsibility of the hospital is: The creation of conditions for health care services covering medical examination and advice, therapy, rehabilitation, diagnostic and laboratory research, nursing medical care over sick and disabled persons. The hospital was founded in 1868. Today the hospital contains of 9 wards, 11 treatment / diagnostics rooms and 13 clinics. About 12 000 persons are treated at the hospital every year. Furthermore, 23 000 persons are yearly treated at the belonging clinics. There are 294 beds and 556 persons of staff including 107 doctors and 229 nurses.

The Deventer Hospital is a general, regional hospital with 1 700 employees, from which 89 are specialists. The hospital covers 22 special areas and accommodates annually 15 000 patients, treats 7 000 patients in day-care and 230 000 outpatients. In 2006 the Deventer Hospital will move to a new building on the site Rielerink, because the old building does not longer meet the requirements of modern health care. The new building design aims at supplying new ways of health care, not only due to the application of modern medical technology but also due to the building design, focusing at the patient’s health and comfort.

The Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (Fraunhofer ISE) is Europe's largest solar energy research institution and part of the Fraunhofer society, Germany's organisation of industrial-related applied research and development. Energy saving technologies in combination with renewable energy sources like PV, active and passive solar thermal technologies and use of daylight for illumination purposes are the main areas of work since the foundation of the institute in 1981. Fraunhofer ISE has a permanent staff of 108 persons and more than 200 students and other personnel.

The HOSPITALS project is financially supported by The European Commission's Directorate-General for Energy and Transport (DGTREN) under the 5'th Framework Progamme for RTD and demonstration on "Energy, Environmental and Sustainable Development - Part B: Energy program". This program supports ambitious innovative and sustainable energy conscious demonstration projects. HOSPITALS will receive financial support of up to 2.894.197,- euro corresponding to 35% of the total eligible costs. Besides the financial support, DGTREN participates actively in the semi-annual HOSPITALS Team meetings and carries out a continuous quality control of the achieved results and supervises the progress of the HOSPITALS project.