Corporate strategies target energy savings

National Report--For years, many hotels sat on the sidelines when it came to implementing energy-conservation programs. Currently, however, it's hard to find a major hotel company that doesn't have some sort of energy-management program.

As energy-efficient product costs have declined and environmental awareness has risen, hotel companies-big and small-realize the benefits of an energy-conservation program far outweigh preliminary costs, according to Tedd Saunders, co-owner and executive v.p. of Saunders Hotel Group and president of EcoLogical Solutions, an environmental consulting firm servicing the hospitality industry.

"The process might be different when developing a corporate program for a large company versus a small one, yet the results are the same whether you have 500 hotels or 40," Saunders said, adding that a corporate energy-management program helps hotels determine where they can get the biggest bang for their buck.

"A corporate program can help hotel companies put their arms around the savings," said Mike Vaughan, a principal at Tharaldson Energy Group, a consulting firm.

Consider Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, for example. With 115 owned hotels, Starwood has an energy-management team dedicated to helping the company save money and develop environmentally conscious programs. Some of Starwood's energy practices include enhancing the physical plants, installing new guestroom energy-management controls and implementing ozone laundry systems, which use less hot water and gas. The ozone laundry systems will help Starwood save at least $15,000 per property, according to Robert Gisolfi, Starwood's energy program manager.

Smaller hotel groups also are jumping on the corporate energymanagement bandwagon. One of those is Saunders Hotel Group, which has three properties in Boston. The Lenox Hotel, Copley Square Hotel and Comfort Inn & Suites Airport/Boston each have in-house engineers to handle day-to-day energy-management issues. But the corporate direction is driven by Saunders, whose staff at EcoLogical Solutions examines each property's energy consumption to make money-saving recommendations.

"It's not a cookie cutter approach," he said, adding that the Comfort Inn & Suites and Copley Plaza each use energy-efficient heating and cooling units in the guestrooms.

The company decided to take another approach with the 100-year-old Lenox Hotel, which recently underwent a major exterior renovation.

"When we were doing the restoration, we used a new state-of-the-art energy-efficient building skin," Saunders said.

An efficient program, however, can be kicked off simply by examining utility bills. Energy-management experts know how to look for peak consumption periods and price spikes. They also can keep an eye out for how each hotel compares to peer properties in regions with similar weather.

"Information is king," said John Healy, v.p. of facilities at White Lodging Services, which owns and operates 89 hotels.

If hoteliers have systems in place to help them determine how much each hotel spends on energy, they can run that information through a database to ascertain how each property is faring.

"If you know what you're spending, you can make changes," Healy said. "For me, the most important thing is knowledge and awareness."

Taking proactive measures to lower utility bills can reduce them as much as 10 percent, according to Saunders.

"That saves a lot of money and goes right to your bottom line," he said.

At White Lodging, there's no "one size fits all" program, but the company can reduce energy expenses by buying new products, instituting new procedures or buying utilities differently in a particular market.

La Quinta Corp. takes a similar approach. For starters, all hotel utility bills are sent to the corporate office. Then, Tharaldson helps energy manager Mike Milburn input all bill information into a database. If a bill is particularly high, someone from the corporate energy office is dispatched to that hotel to see what can be done to save energy.

Deregulated markets

La Quinta's energy-management team also tracks electricity rates nationwide to determine where it can get the best deals in deregulated markets. By entering deals to buy energy at fixed rates, hotels minimize the risk of spending more money on rising rates.

Meyer Jabara Hotels, a Connecticut-based company with 28 owned and operated properties, also buys energy on the deregulated market for its hotels whenever possible.

"We do this at different periods throughout the year to take advantage of lower prices on the market," said Si Sloman, executive v.p. "Over the years, we've seen a significant savings in our utility costs."

The third way La Quinta corporate helps its 281 company-owned hotels conserve energy is by emphasizing an educational program in which employees are taught simple ways to save energy, such as shutting window shades at certain times of the day.

Although some energy-saving products are purchased on a caseby-case basis, La Quinta also has instituted product changes throughout the chain. For example, in 1999, the company retrofitted about 150,000 incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs.

"Compact fluorescents use 75 percent less energy than incandescents and last twice as long," Milburn said. La Quinta also replaced most of its air-conditioning systems with more efficient models last year. This initiative allowed the company to reap rebate benefits in California and Texas.

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