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New Report Examines State of Convention Center Sustainability

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Greenview has released another report—this one entitled “Green Venue Report 2014—The State of Convention Center Sustainability.” It was produced in partnership with Twirl Management. The study’s organizers aim to answer the following questions in the report: What are the individual and collective footprints (positive and negative) of events taking place within convention centers? What are best practices in the industry that more convention centers (and their event organizer clients) can benefit from? What innovative efforts by convention centers should be recognized and celebrated?

According to Cara Unterkofler, Director, Greenview, a total of 37 convention centers, all of which were in the United States and Canada, were approached and invited to participate in a 108-question survey. The questions covered topics ranging from energy to waste to water to communications. Only 16 convention centers were able to complete the survey. Most of those that did have a full-time sustainability coordinator in place. The study’s authors admit that, due to the limited response, the results do not represent the entire industry, but rather a sub-set of top performers and industry leaders. It is the goal of Greenview and Twirl Management to expand the number of participants and make the report an annual one.

Surprising Finding in Report

Many of the convention centers included in the report have been featured at one time or another in Green Lodging News. Among the participants: the Colorado Convention Center, Sands Expo and Convention Center, and the Vancouver Convention Centre (B.C.). You can read the report for the key findings but one of the findings I found most surprising is the following: Eleven of 16 centers reported that less than 20 percent of event organizers discuss “greening” during the planning process, and for some centers only a handful of planners discuss sustainability. I was under the impression that sustainability now enters the meeting planner/host discussion the majority of the time. A lot more work apparently needs to be done to educate meeting planners about what can be done to green a meeting.

The report addresses topics such as access to mass transit, certification, whether or not a sustainability policy is in place, the prevalence of green teams, and the degree to which convention centers detail their green commitment to planners and other meeting stakeholders. Throughout the report many of the participating centers are profiled and there are many fascinating best practices highlighted. For example, all responding centers are using green cleaning products to some degree, and 14 of 16 (88 percent) have a written green cleaning policy.

Interestingly, 12 of the 16 responding centers track greenhouse gas emissions as a venue. And, seven of the responding centers indicated they are able to track and report energy use by event.

Greenview and Twirl Management plan to make the next survey available in spring 2015. All questions related to performance data in the just released report pertained to 2012 full-year data. All questions related to practice information pertained to implemented practices as of the date of surveying (November 2013).

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