Sustainability Trends in the Hospitality Industry

Go Green – It’s good for the world and good for bringing in hotel guests.

 

Sustainable tourism is not just a rising travel trend. Eco-consciousness is also quickly becoming a priority for hospitality leaders and hotel businesses around the world.

This is due to the fact that tourism contributes to about 5% of global greenhouse gas emissions — a figure that Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership expects to grow by 130% by 2035.

Fortunately, hoteliers have realized that natural and sustainable elements can be incorporated into a property to enhance guest experience, cut energy costs, lower their carbon footprint and drive overall revenue.

 

Here’s a look some eco-friendly practices that support sustainability and connect guests to the local environment.

 

 

1. Food Preparation. Using local produce and/or farm-to-table dining is becoming more popular as an effective way to reduce carbon footprint and offer travelers a unique opportunity to experience a greater connection to the locations they are visiting.

2. Waste Reduction. A step beyond recycling, eliminating single-use plastic products (like water bottles, straws and plastic bags) can help limit the huge amount of waste stemming from creating and discarding these items.

 

 

 

3. Water Conservation. Offering a voluntary linen reuse program, converting to low flow or dual flush toilets and using rainwater harvesting, are easy ways to save water without impacting the guest experience in a negative way.

4. Energy Conservation. Hotels globally are working to reduce energy use while sustaining—and, whenever possible, enhancing—the guest experience. One way they are doing this is by maximizing the use of energy-efficient natural light. One easy and cost-effective way to do this is to add tubular daylighting devices (TDDs). These are installed on the roof where they harvest daylight and shoot it down through a highly reflective tube and into the interior space, flooding it with natural light.

 

 

5. Eco-Friendly Materials and Design. In an increasingly technologized world, the longing for nature is growing. That’s why more and more hotel designers are integrating the principles of biophilia (connection to nature) and biophilic design into the large-scale design plans of their buildings to meet the expectations of their guests, new and old.

 

 

 

 

 

See it in action!

Watch how The Emery Hotel used eco-friendly and biophilic design to create a sustainable, lush, comfortable and inviting space in the heart of Minneapolis, producing a dreamy, naturally lit and one-of-a-kind environment that will stay with the guest long after they leave the hotel.

 

 

Do you have a project and would like to learn more about the benefits of natural light? We can help find solutions by incorporating daylighting into your projects, from spec writing to daylight modeling to a simple consultation.

Call 888.SOLATUBE to set up a free consultation or visit Solatube.com to find your local distributor.