I will be attending the American Hotel & Lodging Association’s third annual Responsible Stay Summit on Thursday, March 27. Be sure to watch for coverage on Green Lodging News. The event is being held at the Four Seasons Hotel, Washington, D.C. Up to 150 are expected to attend. I attended the event last year as well. I am looking forward to this learning and networking opportunity. (Click here for preview article.) AHLA has been very active in recent years in making it as easy as possible to run a sustainable hotel. At the core of its Responsible Stay initiative is...

World Water Day is Saturday, March 22. World Water Day celebrates water and raises awareness of the 2.2 billion people living without access to safe water. It is also about taking action to reduce your property’s water consumption. Green Lodging News dedicates a section of its website to water conservation. There are currently more than 1,200 articles in that section that is filled with hundreds of water conservation best practices and ideas. What steps have you taken to reduce water consumption? Can you do more? Reducing water consumption is one of the cornerstones of every company’s overall sustainability initiative. The 2030 Agenda...

Saturday, March 22 from 8:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. local time, Earth Hour will take place. Since its beginnings in 2007, Earth Hour has been known for its “lights off” moment, with individuals around the world switching off their lights to show symbolic support for the Earth. Two years ago, the organizers of Earth Hour began encouraging participants to also give an hour for Earth—spending 60 minutes doing something positive for our planet. This year, the Fauchon L'Hotel Paris plans to celebrate Earth Hour at The Grand Cafe Fauchon from 7 to 10:30 pm. Diners will have the opportunity to enjoy a...

I have always had a fascination with the night sky. I remember seeing Halley’s Comet in 1986 and Comet Kohoutek in 1973. I have never seen the Northern Lights but hope to someday. Here in Florida, we are far from the Northern Lights. Light pollution hides most stars in the Tampa area, but I don’t have to travel far to see thousands of them. Nearly two thirds of Americans live in areas where it’s difficult to see stars glimmering, and about one third of the world’s population miss out completely on the beauty of stargazing. According to Booking.com, 2025 is set...

Earlier this month Green Lodging News reported that University of New Mexico Health Sciences researchers have detected microplastics in human brains at much higher concentrations than in other organs—and the plastic accumulation appears to be growing over time, having increased 50 percent over just the past eight years. Microplastics—tiny bits of degraded polymers that are ubiquitous in our air, water and soil—have lodged themselves throughout the human body, including the liver, kidney, placenta and testes, over the past half century. The constant use and laundering that hotel fabrics endure result in a vast amount of unavoidable synthetic textile shedding, contributing to...

You can do many things at your property to reduce associated CO2 emissions. Incorporating products and technologies that help you avoid energy consumption in the first place is a great way to start. There are hundreds of best practice examples on Green Lodging News, especially in the Energy Management section of the website. One unique technology that Minnesota’s Radisson Blu Mall of America (MOA) has incorporated for the last couple of years in its mechanical room is CarbinX. Made by CleanO2, CarbinX is a small-scale carbon capture device that sequesters CO2 emissions from hotel water boilers, reducing carbon emissions by...

The first half of the conference and trade show season is heating up with The NAFEM Show scheduled this month (February 26 to 28). To be held at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, this year’s show will feature hundreds of exhibitors with just about anything you can imagine for your kitchen—from air curtains to biodigesters to walk-in cooler systems. Twenty thousand food service industry professionals are expected to attend. As in past years, NAFEM will have a “What’s Hot! What’s Cool!” section of the trade show floor. It will feature the newest, most innovative products from more than...

“Embracing differences and putting people first is part of our culture of inclusion and the way we do business,” says Marriott International. “Our core strength lies in our ability to support diversity, equity, and inclusion by creating opportunities for our associates, guests, owners and franchisees, and suppliers.” “As a business of people serving people, our primary focus is creating a culture that best serves our Team Members, business partners, and community members,” Hilton says. “We foster inclusive growth by enabling everyone to participate in and benefit from travel. From creating career opportunities for our Team Members and our neighbors, to...

Way back in December 2009, I wrote a column focused on worker safety. Around that time, the Las Vegas Sun reported that during the construction of Las Vegas’ CityCenter, six construction workers were killed. The Las Vegas Sun also reported that for one 18-month stretch, 20 construction workers lost their lives along The Strip. That was quite a price to pay for glitzy new hotels. This past week, HospitalityLawyer.com cited a recent article by law firm Fisher Phillips that reported on the total number of workplace fatalities in the U.S. hospitality industry in 2023. According to Fisher Phillips, there were...

Should guests pay extra for a greener guestroom experience? Crescent Hotels & Resorts thinks so. Based in Fairfax, Va., and with more than 120 hotels under management, Crescent and Grove Collaborative Holdings, Inc. recently announced a partnership pilot that has guests paying a premium of $50 for a Beyond Plastic Stay at five Crescent properties. According to a press release, guests who participate in a Beyond Plastic Stay will save the equivalent of 50 plastic water bottles during their stay. I recently reached out to Crescent several times for comments on the program but did not hear back. Grove Collaborative...