SPECIAL REPORT
The Scandic Lerkendal in Trondheim , Norway
SCANDIC HOTELS , STOCKHOLM , SWEDEN
Scandic employees are trained in the company ’ s sustainability program , which is based on the Ten Principles of the United Nations Global Compact . From 2012-15 , the company , with 280 hotels in six northern European countries , lowered food waste per breakfast guest by 50 %, to 70 grams per guest , and 67 % of all waste is recycled . Scandic Lerkendal , one of Norway ’ s largest conference facilities , uses 25 % of the energy of similar hotels ; solar panels produce energy for about 20 % of the hotel ’ s total needs . Moving forward , the focus is on finding digital solutions to monitor different environmental aspects of the hotels and being able to track a hotel ’ s environmental impact in real time .
“ To me there is a myth in saying that if you ’ re doing an environmentally sustainable hotel , it has to be more expensive than not ,” he says . In 2018 the company ’ s Bali resorts will launch a program called Zero to Landfill with a company that will treat waste .
‘ MONEY IS NOT THE DRIVER ’ “ If the hotel can be designed correctly
ACCORDING TO THE 2017 GREEN LODGING TRENDS REPORT , WITH DATA FOR 2,093 HOTELS IN 46 COUNTRIES ( MOST IN ASIA PACIFIC AND MOSTLY FULL-SERVICE ):
76 % train staff at least annually on green practices
7 % purchase carbon offsets or renewable energy certificates
68 % benchmark energy performance against peer properties in their portfolio
41 % measure carbon footprint to start with , then the property and the investment of the owner is way ahead ,” says Alexa Poortier , founder of Now . The organization is introducing an online tool this month that tracks the sustainability and performance of hotels that join it ; results are shown in a dashboard to hotel employees and guests .
1 Hotels ’ sustainable ethos was explored more fully with the 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge , the brand ’ s first new-build , including water capture , wind power , bird safety , solar gain and integrated landscaping , says Donna Rodriguez , vice president of marketing at parent SH Group . “ All of these factors required small incremental investments but were also sound business practices and supported our LEED certification .” The hotel installed a building management system to monitor and control energy performance , and is undergoing a measurement and verification plan to “ more directly contribute to better energy performance and provide useful information to the building operators ,” she says .
Conscious Hotels , an independent brand in Amsterdam founded in 2009 , has three hotels there and will open a fourth , entirely powered by Dutch wind energy , in 2018 .
“ One reason for maybe not growing as fast as that is that we don ’ t have a large pool of investors that are keen to work together with us in transforming ( their ) building to the most energy-efficient one could imagine ,” he says . “ So it ’ s always , I wouldn ’ t say a fight , but it ’ s part of the negotiations . Sometimes , and as not being the building owner , you have to compromise on a few things in order to get them to do something and other things – maybe they are not ready to do it , and maybe they are willing to do it afterwards .”
He adds , “ Money is not the driver . Return on investment is not the driver . The driver is to create cool meeting places , nice hotels where we see people that visit us enjoy the environment .”
32 hotelsmag . com January / February 2018