GATLINBURG, TENN.—As the first LEED-certified hotel in Tennessee, the Hilton Garden Inn, in Gatlinburg, required careful planning and collaboration by its executive staff, contractor, supporting vendors and LEED-accredited architect. In the end, the 118-room hotel came together as a well-integrated “green” facility. Every system was examined in order to heighten hotel sustainability, even the in-house laundry, which comes complete with an ozone system, soft-mount, high-speed washer-extractors and high-efficiency dryers. In five years, that “green” laundry is expected to save the hotel $60,196.
01/07/2010
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OAKBROOK, ILL.—1888 Mills is a leading global manufacturer of home and commercial textiles catering to the commercial, retail and healthcare markets worldwide. Consistent with their brand purpose of “Weaving a Better World,” the company has adopted the Triple Bottom Line approach to measure its impact: People, Planet, Profit. Their framework for sustainability encompasses both environmental and social objectives while maintaining cost competitiveness.
10/02/2009
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SAN FRANCISCO—Opened in February 2008, the InterContinental San Francisco has embraced the “green triple bottom line” of Social Responsibility, Eco Responsibility, and Fiscal Responsibility. According to Harry Hobbs, director of engineering, recycling was the first step. During pre-opening, plans were put in place to work with the hotel’s waste hauler to bring in a compactor and blue cardboard recycling containers. They originally budgeted $264,000 annually for waste removal fees based on zero recycling. Once the recycling program was implemented, they saved more than $120,000 annually in waste removal fees. How was this done?
09/25/2009
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SAN LUIS OBISPO, CALIF.—Growing operational costs and lower than average occupancy rates spurred Apple Farm Inn and Suites, San Luis Obispo, Calif., to explore economic and facility efficiency benefits obtained through the installation of an ozone laundry system. At the Apple Farm Inn laundry facility, an evaluation was conducted in late 2006 to early 2007, comparing the costs of laundering by traditional methods versus ozone laundering.
07/15/2009
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ALLISTON, ONT.—Enroute to replacing an aging dehumidifier for its natatorium, the Nottawasaga Inn Resort discovered that recent dehumidification technology advancements offered solutions to the challenging eye and lung irritation nuisance of every indoor pool—chloramines. The year-round convention/resort facility 40 miles north of Toronto has become Canada’s first indoor pool facility to use gas-phase air purification—part of its new dehumidifier purchase—to combat chemical odors that are common among natatoriums. Indoor air quality (IAQ) improved quickly and significantly as a result of eliminating chloramines.
06/30/2009
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Hotels throughout the United States are focused these days on two critical issues: First, how to evolve into an efficient “green” contributor to our environment and secondly, saving money. Often, the misconception is if you do one you can’t do the other. Hotels have bed pillows. Traditionally, pillows are replaced at cost upwards of $25 to $30 per pillow depending on the quantity, size, quality and fill. Old pillows end up in the local landfill, taking a considerable amount of space and requiring substantial cost to get them there. If a hotel has 6,000 pillows and plans to replace 1,000 pillows per year as an ongoing expenditure, the annual expense can be staggering.
03/09/2009
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SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS—The Holiday Inn Select is located near the San Antonio airport and only minutes from beautiful downtown and its many attractions. With its recent $6 million dollar renovation, the hotel and its 397 guestrooms are fully equipped to accommodate every traveler’s needs, whether for business or pleasure. San Antonio has been experiencing a drought for many years. Increased population growth is also straining the water resources, and water restrictions are enforced year-round. Many industries rely on water for their survival, and hospitality is no different.
02/21/2009
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BASS RIVER, MASS.—Imagine you are the plant manager for a 125-room resort with two very old boilers that badly need to be replaced. The job may well involve building riggers, taking out a doorway and opening up the floor in several guestrooms to lower new, replacement boilers into the basement with a crane—in short, a potentially massive project for a building of this size. That was the scenario facing John E. Gilligan, III, vice president and general manager for the Riviera Beach Resort on Cape Cod in Bass River, Mass. Open six months of the year, April through October, Riviera Beach is a family-oriented resort, boasting 500 feet of private sandy beach along with three pools, a restaurant and a lounge.
02/21/2009
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WASHINGTON, D.C.—The Mandarin Oriental, Washington D. C., is a five-star luxury hotel with more than 400 rooms, an award-winning restaurant and other amenities reminiscent of the finest hospitality traditions of The Far East. Not long ago, the hotel was confronted with a major cooling tower sludge problem. Massive amounts of the nasty stuff were detected in the chiller tubes, and the 12-inch system feeder pipe as well. The filtering apparatus on line proved ineffective at combating the problem, prompting management to seek out expert consultation.
01/21/2009
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WASHINGTON, D.C.—One of the contributors to the U.S. Green Building Council’s new headquarters was the family-owned, East Longmeadow, Mass.-based company Excel Dryer Inc., which donated their new high speed, energy efficient XLERATOR® hand dryers. Just as the USGBC has shed a new light on green building and design, the XLERATOR has helped to change the way people think about hand dryers. Because of its new patented technology, the XLERATOR works three times faster than conventional dryers while using 80 percent less energy.
11/26/2008
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