SUSTAINABLE HOTELS – ENVIRONMENTAL REPORTING

The 2005 World Sustainable Building Conference,
Tokyo, 27-29 September 2005 (SB05Tokyo)

04-006

SUSTAINABLE HOTELS – ENVIRONMENTAL REPORTING ACCORDING TO GREEN GLOBE
21, GREEN GLOBES CANADA / GEM UK, IHEI BENCHMARKHOTEL AND HILTON
ENVIRONMENTAL REPORTING

Paulina BOHDANOWICZ, M.Sc.1
Branko SIMANIC, M.Sc.2
Ivo MARTINAC, Ph.D.3
1

Department of Energy Technology, Royal Institute of Technology, Brinellvägen 60, 100 44 Stockholm,
Sweden, [e-mail]
2
Department of Energy Technology, Royal Institute of Technology, Brinellvägen 60, 100 44 Stockholm,
Sweden, [e-mail]
3
Department of Energy Technology, Royal Institute of Technology, Brinellvägen 60, 100 44 Stockholm,
Sweden, [e-mail]

Keywords: hotels, environmental reporting, benchmarking, Green Globe 21, Green Globes Canada, IHEI benchmarkhotel, Hilton Environmental Reporting

Summary
The ever increasing environmental loads generated in/by the built environment, and their growing diversity call for more effective measures aimed at reducing the ecological footprint of buildings. In the tourism industry, hotels account for a significant amount of the overall pollution generated by this sector. The potential of implementing more sustainable practices in the hotel sector requires the availability of reliable tools for assessment and benchmarking of hotel environmental performance. A number of such tools have been developed by international environmental organizations, branch associations and even hotel corporations. The various schemes differ with regard to geographical/climatic areas covered, types of hotel facilities included, detail of environmental information required, benchmarking methods, user-friendliness and implementation cost.
In this paper, four reporting and benchmarking schemes (three of them Internet-based) will be presented and compared, followed by a discussion of their relevance and usefulness for the hotel sector. The tools

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