WORLDWIDE: The Institute of Travel Management held a webinar with the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance to talk about sustainable practice and metrics in the accommodation sector. Felicity Cousins reports.
ITM invited Claire Whitely, head of environment at the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance, to talk about what is happening in the hospitality sector and how hotels and corporate travel programmes can be doing more to achieve ESG targets.
The aim of the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance is to enable every single hotel – across the globe – to operate sustainably and responsibly. Of course the initiatives discussed in the webinar can be applied across the accommodation sector to any type of accommodation outside of traditional hotels including extended stay options and serviced apartments.
The webinar session, hosted by ITM, was aimed at travel buyers and bookers – and focussed on how to ensure travel programmes can support and develop ESG and give power to those asking for sustainable data and metrics in the sector.
The Sustainable Hospitality Alliance is a charitable organisation, which has the vision that responsible hospitality can make a better world. It currently has around 35,000 hotels in the membership and engages across the industry and covers large hotel groups to small independent hotels.
Claire Whitely, head of environment at the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance says: “By bringing together these companies we are trying to use the collective knowledge and power that’s out here on key environmental and social issues on a local and global scale. Our members make up 35 per cent of the global industry by rooms and we are growing rapidly as [the sector] takes a stronger stance on sustainability.”
And it’s not just the operational side of the hotel but the entire supply chain that comes with running a hotel.
Whitely adds: “We cannot overcome the challenges we face by working in silos, so we need collective action. We also develop practical tools and insights from our members.”
The Sustainable Hospitality Alliance is in the process of creating a five year strategy but it already has several tools available for travel buyers and bookers to look at. One of its key tools is the carbon and water measurement tool being used for reporting and metrics by more than 30,000 hotels around the world.
Everything on the website is free and open to everyone – not just members. These are some of the resources buyers will find, which can help with making sustainable accommodation programmes.
HCMI data for travel buyers
For travel buyers one of the difficult aspects of nailing down a hotel’s sustainable practices and data is how things are measured. In the past hotels all used different ways of presenting figures and it was difficult to merge the data to understand the comparable performances.
The hotel carbon measurement initiative HCMI was created 10 years ago with the idea that hotels complete documents and self report on their emissions. If every hotel used the same metrics then it would make it much easier for those reporting and analysing data for key ESG targets.
Using the HCMI there is also the ability for a travel buyer to benchmark the results with Cornell Hotel Sustainability Benchmark (they benchmark thousands across the world and you can pick out different hotels across the world and see if the data you are getting is good or bad).
HCMI can also be incorporated into different hotel systems so reporting comes unter their brand such as IHG’s Green Engage.
The HCMI also aligns with greenhouse gas protocol and ISO 14064.
Using the metrics from HCMI a travel buyer will see the total carbon footprint, footprint per occupied room and area of meeting space, and the renewable energy and electricity as a portion of total consumption. For those staying in presidential suites or serviced apartments, however there is currently no system of differentiating for the size of room – something which will need to be addressed.
Total carbon footprint for MICE
The Sustainable Hospitality Alliance is also currently updating the tool and creating a report, which can auto calculate particular meetings and event stays so a hotel can show buyers how many rooms they are using as well as the meeting space. The report works out the carbon footprint figure for the entire meeting. This data can then help make smarter decisions for MICE programmes.
Sustainability Guidance Notes
On the website there is guidance determining the sustainability of hotels in a supply chain. It offers guidance one what questions buyers should be asking and who those questions should go to, to really get down to the sustainability of the property. The guidance recommends asking for carbon and water initiatives data (HCMI and HWMI) and even has a list of questions to ask the properties.
Fragmentation in the industry
One of the issues with reporting on sustainable practices is that by its nature the hotel industry is so fragmented. Even if you take one property as an example – someone owns it, someone else might operate it and then there may be a brand involved too. Getting each team to collaborate and follow the same pathways is tricky but they all have an impact on the hotel, so they all need to drive sustainable practices and understanding and action across the industry.
To help with this fragmentation the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance has created a pathway to net positive hospitality.
Whitely says: “There is fragmentation across the industry and everyone is at different places within their journeys. Some are further ahead than others but the majority of the industry is right at the starting line. We believe wherever they are on that journey they should be able to reach a net positive point over the years. The pathway covers key environment issues and looks at different levels of action and ambition.”
Questions from buyers
At the end of the webinar buyers asked questions.
Question: Is it possible to pull this data at chain level rather than individual hotels?
Answer: Yes chains can provide reports on that and key account managers can pull together the data on all the hotel rooms you are purchasing over the course of the year. This helps with rfp sourcing.
Question: We’d like to see all hotel information – not just the preferred hotels on our books. Is this possible?
Answer: Yes we think it’s become very clear we need a centralised source of data, which is the one source of truth, so we are going to be working to be the holders of that one source of truth.
Question: Chains like Travelodge and its business booker don’t provide reporting – how can we work on that as we can’t see the emissions for these chains?
Answer: There has been work done and we created a methodology for net zero and alignment and how that can be reported, but there is still work to do.
Question: HCMI is self certified so how confident can we be with the data hotels are providing?
Answer: Yes it is self certified at the moment because we don’t have the ability to gather the data individually – our role has been about providing the aligned way of reporting – there is strong guidance in the document and what they should be including over 12 months. I’d like to think the majority of hotels are being honest with the data but it is always difficult if it’s a self run process.
Question: Does it matter what size room someone stays in for the carbon footprint? Does the same data come back for someone who stayed in a presidential suite or a standard room?
Answer: We do need to look at the other ways we can improve the methodology, one of which is whether we can provide an estimation of footprint of a standard room versus a suite.
Question: What data should we be asking hotels to share?
Answer: Key metrics buyers are looking for is carbon and water so we recommend asking about HCMI and HWMI. This makes it easier for hotels if everyone asks for the same data and gives them more time to make the changes too. It enables you to have the comparable information, which should be better quality if they can focus on one type of data.
Question: Do you work with TMCs to ensure reporting is accurate?
Answer: We are just starting to have those relationships because they are all starting to look at how to provide data to their customers. It’s definitely rising up the agenda for many people. When bookings are through TMC they have a vested interest to meet the ESG goals.
SAN reported on another ITM webinar about trends in serviced apartment sector with Silverdoor here.
The Institute of Travel Management is dedicated to supporting and developing all those involved in corporate travel. Established in 1956, ITM represents more than 5,000 business travel buyers and suppliers across the UK and Ireland. ITM’s Autumn Conference is on October 3rd. The ITM Spring Conference is in Brighton next year. See the website here.
The Sustainable Hospitality Alliance was founded in 1992 off the back of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio. Initially the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance covered the environmental aspects of sustainability but it then expanded its scope to more social aspects of sustainability within the sector. Through global partnerships working with governments, private sector and non profits to focus on the sustainable development goals the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance looks at both people – e.g human trafficking, youth employment, modern slavery – as well as the planet. For more information and for resources for buyers and hotels see here.
