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Saving energy - what initiatives does your workplace have?

This occurred to me last week when I stayed overnight at the Radisson SAS at Stansted Aiport. I found that I couldn't operate any of the electrics in the room, such as lights/TV/air conditioning, unless my keycard was placed in a card holder inside the room. I haven't come across this in any of the hotels I've stayed at in the past and thought it was a good idea, saving on energy which would otherwise be wasted by lights and air con being left on when the guest was not in the room. (That it took me ten minutes stumbling round in the dark until the penny dropped is neither here nor there).

Most hotels have signs in the bathroom encouraging guests to re-use their towels, but I was wondering what initiatives other members have come across either in their workplace or staying in a hotel themselves. I'd be interested to hear about other experiences.

Apropos of nothing, this particular hotel also had a giant wine rack in the middle of the bar which was only accessible to the bar staff-cum-acrobats who had to hoist themselves up it to collect bottles and rappel back down. Visually stunning and an 'eh?' factor of at least 9.5.

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Permalink Reply by Jose Ruiz on July 6, 2009 at 7:52pm: Great idea Sonya and one we have already highlighted here in hotcatUK in the past.

The Berkeley hotel (where I work) carried out a fantastic initiative last year and we posted an article here and Margie Tosch posted a very interesting article about the amount of waste produce by take away restaurants here.

Both very relevant.

I look forward to hear about other initiatives.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Marcus Weedon on July 7, 2009 at 5:33pm: Sonya,

The Giant Wine Rack sounds wierd but strangely interesting, i will pop into the hotel to see this myself.

I to have expereinced the keycard in many lower budget hotel in London and some 4 star hotels outside of London, and i guess its a great idea apart from when you have been out all night and then try and find the card, usual ends up in a wallet with a mountain of other cards which i find annoying, but the principle is a good one.

A friend of mine went to the Apex Hotel in Scotland a couple of months back and they had motion detectors in the rooms so it knew when someone was in the room and then the electricity was able to be used, which I thought was an interesting concept

He was speaking to a member of staff who told him that they encouraged them to cycle to work as well instead of using their cars or other public transport, but would also arrange Taxis for more than one members of staff late at night so to get people home and not use 2 or 3 taxi's which i thought was a really cool idea.

Not sure if most Restaurants or Hotels in London encourage this?; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Sonya Lipczynska on July 8, 2009 at 8:26am: Hi there, thanks for the replies, and Jose for posting the links. The Berkeley initiative looks very impressive.

Marcus, it was a sight to be seen, I'll add a photo to the article (taken at 2 in the morning after a bumpy flight back from Poland so not the best quality but should give you some idea!)

I like the motion sensor idea, practical and efficient and good to hear that other hotels have espoused the keycard idea. Apex also has some good ideas which shows that it only takes a bit of forward planning to save energy.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Tom Shorney on July 8, 2009 at 7:33pm: From my experience the hotel that I worked at offered to only change the sheet once every three days in an attempt to save energy. This actually proved to be a very popular choice with many guests now thinking 'green' so to speak.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Jose Ruiz on July 9, 2009 at 8:00pm: A few very simple ideas I have seen:

- shared printers, where everyone in an office share the same printer.
- always printing double sided
- Print only when necessary (have you ever attended a management meeting where each and every person in attendance comes with a 20 page arrival list?)
- Recycling bins in every office; ▶ Reply to This