NIANTIC, CONN.—The InterContinental San Francisco hotel is reaping the financial and environmental benefits of implementing the e4 Smart Digital Thermostat developed by Niantic, Conn.-based INNCOM, a leader in advanced guestroom automation systems for hotels and resorts. According to the INNCOM tracking system, the property saved $75,491 on energy costs from January to September 2010.
“With the INNCOM EMS and e4 Smart Digital Thermostat, we can allow guests a much greater amount of control and responsiveness than we could with systems that simply turn everything off,” says Harry Hobbs, InterContinental San Francisco director of engineering. “Most of the time the features provided are completely transparent to our guests, and that’s the way we want to keep it.”
The upscale convention/destination property, which opened in February 2008, towers 32 stories above the heart of downtown San Francisco and is located next to the Moscone Convention Center and near Union Square, Chinatown and other San Francisco attractions. The InterContinental San Francisco features 550 rooms, 14 suites, 43,000 square feet of flexible meeting space, a 10-room treatment spa, full-service fitness center, an indoor pool and the Michelin-starred Luce restaurant. In short, San Francisco’s newest downtown property is the definition of luxury and convenience.
To further support the InterContinental’s focus on green practices and awareness, the hotel installed the patented INNCOM ecoMODE, inviting guests to choose the extent to which they want to be eco-friendly. By selecting the ecoMODE, the guest allows for greater temperature fluctuation before the heating or cooling system automatically turns on. Most thermostat systems have a plus or minus two degrees variation and the ecoMODE allows for three degrees. To further illustrate, if the room temperature is set at 68 degrees it will go into cooling mode at 70 degrees and heating mode at 66. By using the ecoMODE, this would be 71 degrees and 65 degrees. The feature allows guests to choose to be green minded during their stay while saving energy at the same time.
“My favorite feature on the e4 Smart Digital Thermostat is ecoMODE, a green button option on the unit that empowers our guests to choose to participate in a host of environmentally-friendly and energy-saving programs that we offer at the hotel,” Hobbs said. “Not only does the system prompt guests to be more energy conscious, but it provides a report on how many of our guests actually chose to be green.”
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