More hotels are applying to the U.S. Green Building Council to achieve Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification as a step toward environmental sustainability and efficiency. Approximately 985 existing and developing properties worldwide have registered to become certified, according to the council, while 35 of the 50 that already are approved only just achieved the status in 2009 or 2010. But while travel buyers see value in such certifications, some expect to also see several negotiating cycles before the program's coverage is significant enough to warrant primary consideration in property selection.
One impediment is the difficulty for existing properties to achieve the standard, noted Reed Smith global travel manager Rosanne Russo and Lockheed Martin director of global travel and meeting services Richard Wooten.
"LEED certification is a strong indicator of being green," said Russo. Regarding the LEED pipeline, she said, "the question is, how many out of the 900 will actually get LEED status?"
According to Wooten, "LEED certification is certainly a good direction for the hotels to take, as there are consistent criteria that have to be met to achieve the certification. I will be interested to see how many hotels end up doing this. As more hotels move in this direction, it may start to become one of the factors in deciding which properties will be included in our programs. Right now, we have not applied any biasing towards hotels with LEED as there are so few of them."
"We are seeing clients look more closely at hotels that have implemented green initiatives, but, in all honesty, we still see choices being made in the following order of priority: location, price, and amenities and value-add," said Carol Ann Salcito, president of Management Alternatives. "Green is considered under amenities and value-add. If LEED-certified properties fit the first two criteria, they will have a significant influence in buyer selection."
Hughes Network Systems senior corporate travel manager Ron Tiu said that for travelers, amenities like free wireless Internet rank higher than green credentials. Yet, even if LEED certification is not a must-have, he said, "the travel buying community will reap the benefit when the cost of running a hotel is contained, translating into holding [down] room rates."
Until more hotels are able to achieve the standards that are set by such bodies as the U.S. Green Building Council, travel buyers can investigate hotels' green practices on their own, noted Bruce Finch, director of global travel and workplace sustainability for Autodesk, Inc.
"Autodesk is moving towards contracting with vendors who have robust sustainability initiatives," said Finch. "We have put in place new virtual collaboration tools in order to reduce the need to travel. But, when travel is necessary, we are looking at vendors who are aligned with our philosophy."
Autodesk added green questions to its hotel RFP, asking properties to detail their top five environmental programs, water conservation programs, any environmental certifications and any use of environmentally friendly cleaners.
"These were 'go, no-go' items for us," said Finch. "Given the lack of 'standardized' metrics and certifications that are recognized, it is tough to get a 'green seal of approval' for hotels, but digging into their practices at least helps us to organize a pecking order. We did a lot of investigating, and incorporated other sustainability questions and adapted them to our RFP, so we cannot take total credit for them. In the future, we will only contract with vendors who are aligned with these sustainability practices."
A 'Great Start'
LEED "is a great start and does hold some weight in [showing] that the hotel has been through a stringent process to get certified; of course, there are different levels of certification, but again a good start," said Caro Cook, chief of transportation for the International Monetary Fund. "Most of the hotels we use are overseas in developing countries or countries that do not have a LEED-type program, so it is not something we can apply across our program."
Although just two current LEED properties are located outside the United States, hundreds of non-U.S. hotels in nations like China, India, Italy, Mexico, Russia and the United Arab Emirates have registered.
Regarding different levels of certification, a few of the 50 LEED-certified hotels achieved the status "with distinction," indicated as either bronze, silver, gold or platinum. The majority have a basic certification, which is what Marriott is seeking with a fast-track program for many of its new properties. Two years ago, Marriott International executive Arne Sorenson said a "very low" percentage of the company's development pipeline was LEED-certified; now, more than 50 of the 130 properties in Marriott's development pipeline are aiming for LEED.
The Green Building Council is seeing "a big chunk of projects in the pipeline that are chains," said a spokeswoman. Marriott expects about a dozen LEED properties to open this year. Starwood Hotels and Resorts' LEED certified brand Element has seven properties open and five expected to open this year. InterContinental Hotels Group has three LEED-certified properties.
LEED hotels are "subordinate to a value to system to make sure we are keeping our promises," said Tony Villier, guest services coordinator for the Proximity Hotel, the first LEED platinum hotel. "LEED focuses on the physical aspects of the hotel but for us we are continuing to grow from a sustainable aspect in our operations. There is room for improvement; we are probably 60 percent to where we want to be. There are a number of other certifications that we are looking at right now, but haven't honed in on one."
LEED Alternatives
Hotel companies also are taking steps outside of LEED to make their hotels greener. IHG created the Green Engage program that launched worldwide in August 2009 and since then, 900 hotels agreed to follow guidelines set by IHG to reduce energy consumption, waste and water, according to David Jerome, senior vice president of corporate responsibility for IHG. The program seeks to have 100 percent of owned and managed IHG properties (about 639 hotels) to follow these guidelines along with actively soliciting franchisers to do the same.
"In our owned and managed estate, we seek to achieve an energy savings of 6 percent to 10 percent over the next three years on a per available room basis," according to IHG documents about Green Engage. IHG concluded that if all systemwide hotels, about 4,438 properties, participated in the program, a savings of 15 percent to 25 percent, or $200 million, could be reached.
Jerome said IHG is "looking for a systemwide impact" by placing all hotels regardless of brand on a "fitness program" that measures carbon outputs, in order to trim its overall footprint. "Many of our owners are just looking for ways to be more efficient, to live in the values of being green. Today you are losing money. Stop it. Because it's not a function of 'Can you afford to do it?' It's a function of 'Can you afford not to?' "