Green Product Wave To Roll Out At London's Business Travel Show

Green themes will dominate the new products to be unveiled tomorrow at the Business Travel Show in London. More companies are launching carbon-dioxide emission reporting tools, following the first examples announced during 2006 by the likes of Sabre and American Express.

Tomorrow also will bring the first moves toward providing that information at point of sale for corporate travelers. Carlson Wagonlit Travel will launch a trip request tool that prompts travelers to choose a low-carbon alternative, chiefly by displaying the relevant CO2 emissions for their journey for both air and rail.

Another travel management company, HRG, is enhancing the hotel element of its booking tool, HRG Online. It is adding a green tree symbol for hotels that have gained International Standards Organization accreditation for environmental management. Meanwhile, KDS has pledged to introduce a carbon calculator and related policy restrictions to its corporate booking tool later this year.

Carlson Wagonlit developed its calculator in conjunction with launch client the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in the United Kingdom. In common with other U.K. government departments, DEFRA is committed to reducing its CO2 emissions by 20 percent by the year 2010. It also is contributing to environmental projects to offset the emissions that its business travel continues to produce.

When a traveler fills in an online trip request template, the calculator displays the resulting emissions the journey will cause, and a pop-up window lists the corresponding emissions for the trip by rail if applicable. As an example, according to DEFRA figures, London-Edinburgh produces 96.4kg of CO2 per passenger by air, but only 11.9kg by rail.

The calculator also displays how much it will cost to make an offset contribution for the journey. Jonathan Green, sustainable travel manager for DEFRA, said he is working with Carlson Wagonlit toward deducting the traveler's offset charge from the traveler's budget at the point of sale, along with their travel management company fee. However, Green added, offsetting is not the end, but a means to achieving environmental friendliness. "Carbon-offsetting is not a panacea. We are using it as a communications tool," he said.

HRG will launch a more straightforward carbon calculator as well as back-end reporting at the show, but the green tree symbol is something of a first. Paul Saggar, director of technology product development at HRG, said the feature alerts travelers "to the existence of an environmentally friendly option in the destination of their choice and gives them the opportunity to select accommodation in line with their own environmental policies."

Rail booking tool Thetrainline also will launch emissions reporting data for clients, while in the past week TRX has launched an emissions reporting tool. "Currently, it provides analysis of historic data," said Peter Grover, executive vice-president sales and client services, Europe for TRX, "but there is no reason why we couldn't give pre-trip data as well."