Queen West Animal Hospital
Environment
Check Out Our Bees!
Queen West has partnered with BEE LOCAL 416 to provide rooftop space for urban bees. Our bee hives are hosted by Bee Local in the interest of biodiversity within Toronto. We’re doing our part to save the bees! With a registered beekeeper to manage the colony, hosting bee hives allows us to bring these gentle pollinators to the Queen West neighborhood. Yay for bees!
How We Minimize Our Environmental Impact
We do our best at Queen West Animal Hospital to minimize our environmental impact wherever possible. Highlights of these efforts include:
Solar Hot Water
We are excited to announce the installation of solar hot water on the roof at our new 931 Queen West location! Though common in many tropical and subtropical countries, solar hot water is only just catching on in Ontario. Highly efficient and inherently fossil fuel-free, we’re incredibly proud to use the sun’s energy to supply over 90% of the hot water used at our hospital!
Electric Vehicle Charging Station
We are already one of the only veterinary hospitals in downtown Toronto with dedicated client parking but are also proud to offer a Sun Country 100 amp EV charging station to our staff and clients. Electric cars are more and more the way of the future and Queen West Animal Hospital is incredibly pleased to do our part.
Lighting
In order to save electricity and reduce demand on our power infrastructure, all lighting at our new Queen West Animal Hospital location is LED.
Reducing, Reusing & Recycling
Reducing & Reusing. All office paper is used twice. All office paper purchased at Queen West Animal Hospital is Sustainable Earth by Staples tree-free paper made from sugarcane and bamboo fibers. After sugarcane is crushed to make sugar, the waste fibers are converted into paper. All large-format toilet paper for the building is made from 100% recycled fibers and is chlorine- and fragrance-free. Additionally, we now almost exclusively utilize electronic means with which to contact clients. We even reuse the plastic packaging that comes with our deliveries as poop bags for in-hospital patients!
Recycling. We consider ourselves aggressive recyclers, and actually regularly discuss recycling at staff meetings (we’re nerds) in order to stay up to date on what is and what isn’t recyclable. Recycling guides are posted at all recycling bins and we all do our part to recycle whatever possible. Additionally, we recycle all printer ink cartridges.
Toronto Environment Days
All batteries, unused cleaners, laboratory reagents and chemicals, paints, spent electronics and LED light bulbs avoid the landfill by being taken by staff members every summer to one of the city’s annual Environment Days.
Laundry
Though all surgical and hospital linens are autoclaved for sterility, all regular laundry at Queen West Animal Hospital is washed with cold water as a means to reduce energy consumption.