Caravelle Hotel Sees Green in Green (Vietnam)
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Caravelle Hotel Sees Green in Green (Vietnam)
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Category: Asia Pacific - Vietnam -
This is a press release selected by our editorial committee and published online for free on 2010-04-22
Landmark Vietnam hotel cultivates sustainable practices as growth opportunity
The Caravelle Hotel is finishing work on a second round of ‘green initiatives,’ furthering its commitment to sustainability and environmentally sound best practices in Vietnam.
Its second generation efforts are anchored by the installation of an additional waste water treatment plant where the hotel plans to recycle water for use in it’s A/C cooling towers and in its guest room toilets.
The hotel recently replaced three A/C chillers, reducing its energy footprint by a substantial margin. It also replaced the A/C controllers in every guest room to increase accuracy and efficiency.
In October, the Caravelle rebalanced its hot water system, reducing the amount of time necessary to deliver hot water to guests.
“Once you’ve become sensitized to the need to reduce energy consumption for cost containment purposes, feeling good about environmentally sound practices is a natural consequence, and a stimulus to additional opportunities,” said John Gardner, general manager of the hotel.
He said the hotel was considering swapping its diesel-fired hot water boiler system for a hybrid heat pump/solar panel system. Management hired an environmental officer last year and is now in the midst of an ISO 14001 compliance project.
Part of this process involves implementation of a hotel-wide sorting system for all of its waste products.
“The deeper we get into the this, the brighter the line on the horizon,” said Gardner. “Our sales people, increasingly, are talking to operators and agents who want to know about our green policies because their customers want to know.”
In the same way that renewable energy is emerging as a tremendous growth opportunity, green initiatives are driving opportunities to garner market share, he said.
“Yes, you have to deliver the best bed in town, but you also have to make sure that maintenance of that bed comes with the lowest possible carbon footprint,” said Gardner.
The Caravelle’s efforts won notoriety from the Saigon Times in March when the publisher announced its annual list of Top 40 award winners and cited the Caravelle for its sustainable practices. The award ceremony is April 24.
The hotel launched its ‘Green Initiatives’ program in 2008. Initial efforts involved recycling paper, reusing linens and converting to low-energy bulbs.
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