When looking for best practice information on green hotel operations, where do you go? Is there a website that you visit most often? A book that you read? An event that you attend? Where is the best place to network? Please write to let me know so that I can share that information with our readers. I have discovered that there is a lot of good information available but not all in one place and sometimes the most likely places disappoint. The first place I looked when planning this publication is the Green Hotels Assn. website. The...

There is an element of fear in launching a new concept or implementing a new technology. In some ways it is like jumping off a cliff—with lots of sharks below. Every day I read about risk-taking companies that flirt with failure but find a way to succeed and break new ground for the rest of us. On the green side of the lodging industry, one company that can lay claim to a number of important firsts is Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide. Its Westin Hotels & Resorts was the first chain to go 100 percent nonsmoking and Starwood...

Having represented two suppliers of preventive maintenance (PM) software for several years, I have learned a little bit about the importance of PM. That is why BP PLC’s recent announcement that it would have to shut down part of its Alaska North Slope oil operations to replace 16 miles of damaged pipes struck me as odd. The eastern side of the Prudhoe Bay pipeline had not undergone a high-tech inspection, called “smart pigging,” since 1992, although the western side had been checked in 1998 and was scheduled for a test this summer. Is it just me, or is...

Earlier this year, UNITE HERE, a union representing 90,000 U.S. hotel workers, released the results of a study that showed that hotel housekeepers have a 10.4 percent injury rate, 85 percent higher than the 5.6 percent injury rate of non-housekeepers. Surprised? The study tracked 40,000 hotel workers’ injuries at 87 U.S. lodgings from 1999 to 2005. The American Hotel & Lodging Assn. responded to the study by stating that the injury rate is still lower than other service industries and that the lodging industry has done a lot to address ergonomics and other housekeeper injury issues. That may...

Green Lodging News, as a publication name, works. I am biased, of course, but it is not a name that I spent hours or days thinking about. And, I certainly did not need to hire a consultant to come up with it. Green Lodging News is about as basic as you can get. I suspect a reader does not think about anything other than environmental industry news when reading it or hearing it. It is simple without being misleading or causing any confusion; it is what it is. Names take time to establish. That is why companies spend...

In last week’s column, I strongly advocated the elimination of smoking in all hotels. Two days later, Marriott International Inc. announced it would eliminate smoking throughout all of its more than 2,300 hotels and corporate apartments in the U.S. and Canada beginning in September. Coincidence? I think not. O.K., I kid. But seriously, it is nice to know I am in the right cheering section. Green Lodging News applauds Marriott for its socially responsible decision and encourages the company to also work to stop smoking in its hotels outside of the United States and Canada. The health impact...

Several weeks ago, the Surgeon General issued a report that reiterated what most of us already know: There is no safe level of secondhand cigarette smoke. The report stated that exposure to this smoke puts an estimated 126 million people at risk of heart disease, lung cancer and death. It also increases the risk of sudden infant death syndrome, respiratory conditions, ear infections and severe asthma. “The health effects of secondhand smoke exposure are more pervasive than we previously thought,” said Surgeon General Richard Carmona. Following the Surgeon General report, the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and...

Welcome to Green Lodging News! I am excited to launch this new Web site—www.greenlodgingnews.com—and its associated weekly e-newsletter. Every week day, the site will be updated with information-packed news and features, as well as information on the latest “green” products from the lodging industry’s leading vendors. On Monday of each week, I will bring you even more operations-oriented content by e-mail in the newsletter. It is no coincidence that I chose this moment in time to launch Green Lodging News. Increasing energy costs, a growing traveler and business awareness of environmental issues, and the desire by hotel operators...