Gurugram gets four oxygen generator plants

These have been set up in 3 hospitals with combined capacity of over 3 tonnes/day

An oxygen plant at Sector 10 Civil Hospital in Gurugram.

Four oxygen Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA) generator plants, including two at Sector 10 Civil Hospital, have been set up in three different hospitals in Gurugram with a combined capacity of more than three tonnes per day.

The hospital authorities claimed the plants would be enough to meet their daily pre-COVID days' requirement and do away with their daily dependence on tankers.

The four plants were inaugurated by Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal a week ago.

Deputy Civil Surgeon (Civil Hospital) Maneesh Rathee said the two plants with the capacity of one tonne and half tonne each were set up inside the hospital premises and both were fully functional.

‘Self-sufficient’

“The two plants are enough to meet the daily requirement of oxygen for 70 beds in the hospitals in normal circumstances. Earlier, the oxygen was supplied daily by tankers, but now we are self-sufficient,” said Mr. Rathee.

He, however, conceded that the capacity was not enough to meet the increased demand of oxygen such as during the peak of the COVID wave. Mr. Rathee added that the hospital had 30 big oxygen cylinders to meet increased demand as seen during the second wave and the supply can also be augmented through tankers.

Mr. Rathee, involved with the process of setting up the plants, said hospital authorities were always on tenterhooks during COVID wave since the tankers usually got delayed, but now with the setting up of the plant inside the hospital they could “relax”.

Similarly, two plants with a capacity of one tonne each have been set up at ESIC Hospitals in Sector 9A Gurugram and Sector 3 in Manesar. Medical Superintendent at ESIC Hospitals, Subhra Gupta, said both the plants were functional and they expected to meet their daily pre-COVID days need of oxygen.

All four plants have been donated and installed by Maruti Suzuki under its Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative. The company plans to install 24 more such plants in different parts of the country by mid-June. A separate team has been deployed by the company with round-the-clock monitoring to ensure that these generator plants are installed successfully in hospitals and are operational. The monitoring will continue for a few months to ensure that these generators keep operating satisfactorily well after installation.

Gurugram Chief Medical Officer Virender Yadav said three more such plants would be set up at Sohna, Pataudi and Sector 31 Polyclinic in the city.

“The capacity of the Sohna and Pataudi plants will be 500 Litres Per Minute [LPM] each. We have procured equipment for both hospitals. The capacity for Sector 31 Polyclinic will be 100 LPM,” said Mr. Yadav.