Lebanon — The Planning Board approved a proposal on Monday allowing Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center to build a 1.25-megawatt solar array southeast of its campus parking lots.

The 5-1 decision includes conditions that DHMC receive state wetlands and terrain approval before construction begins. The hospital must also plant 20 additional trees to provide shade to cars and improve parking lot appearances, said associate planner Maggie Howard-Heretakis.

Four arrays consisting of about 3,400 panels will occupy 5.5 acres of land adjacent to parking lots, according to Amec Foster Wheeler, a consulting firm hired by DHMC. Each panel will have a maximum height of about 8 feet and the arrays will be fenced in for security.

The panels could produce as much as 1.5 million kilowatt-hours annually, about 2.3 percent of the hospital’s electricity demands. Over the 20-year life expectancy of the array, hospital officials expect to save $477,000 on electricity costs.

In a letter to city planners, hospital officials said the array is a part of their plan to reduce DHMC’s greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent by 2020.

“Transitioning to renewable energy is a critical step toward achieving that goal,” wrote Dr. Robert Greene, an executive vice president.

The letter also included estimates that the array would contribute slightly to health. By reducing fossil fuel emissions, people could save $4,306 from medical bills related to respiratory problems, asthma attacks and bronchitis, officials said.

Dartmouth-Hitchcock also is preparing to break ground on its new palliative care facility.

The Jack Byrne Center, named for the late Upper Valley insurance executive, is expected to open in 2017.

The center will provide care to seriously ill people enrolled in hospice, but with needs that are difficult to manage away from the hospital.

It’s 12 beds will be administered by the Visiting Nurse Association of Vermont and New Hampshire in collaboration with DHMC’s Section of Palliative Care Medicine.

“It will bring immediate benefits by providing a specific kind of care currently unavailable in the Upper Valley to hospice patients with high-acuity symptoms that cannot be managed at home,” said Dr. Kathryn B. Kirkland, interim chief of DHMC’s Section of Palliative Medicine, in a news release.

In 2014, the Jack and Dorothy Byrne Foundation donated $10 million toward the project’s estimated $22 million construction costs.

An earlier Byrne family donation helped create DHMC’s palliative care program two decades ago.

Tim Camerato can be reached at tcamerato@vnews.com or 603-727-3223.