Check on hotels carbon footprint

BANGKOK, 11 June 2012: Green Leaf Foundation will launch its latest version of a certification programme this October, which will include carbon emission reduction in the grading questionnaires.

A representative from the Green Leaf Foundation, who attended the Thailand Travel Mart Plus,last week, said carbon emission reduction was now a criteria for hotels seeking qualification in the programe.

The initiative involves cooperation between Green Leaf, Designated Areas for Sustainable Tourism Administration and Germany’s Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) and Climate Visualised Tool, a carbon emission calculation programme.

The software calculates and visualises the carbon footprint of a property based on a set of input values such as the electricity use, fuel and the amount of waste.

Green Leaf will soon make it available online to hotels so they can use the programme to see how their properties measure up.

Participating hotels have to draft their own detailed carbon offset projects, while Green Leaf will be giving advice on appropriate practices.

Last year, DASTA and its partners introduced the Climate Visualise Tool to hotels on Chang Island as a pilot project. Based on field observation the programme is now being offered a wider application in Green Leaf

One of the main problems is getting hotels to input accurate data and even obtaining the correct data from their systems that are designed to offer financial related or performance data. There is also a trust aspect as hoteliers have to input genuine information to make it work accurately.

Green Leaf admits it is difficult to introduce and to even convince hotels there is value. But in the long-run it will help to identify both strengths and weaknesses. If short-comings are corrected it could be used as a marketing tool to attract more guests.

Sourced: ttrweekly