NEW YORK (CNNfn) - If you're a business traveler with an environmental conscience, you can now rest easier while on the road.
In an era of growing ecological awareness, lodging companies have taken to a wide range of approaches, from recycling programs and energy-conservation to the use of "green" cleansing agents and allowing guests to forgo clean linens every morning.
At the 391-room Quality Hotel Courthouse Plaza in Arlington, for example, general manager Don Mayer says one-third of guests generally elect to forgo freshly changed sheets and towels.
Hotels are responding to guest demands for environmental concessions over convenience -- and with but a little effort business travelers can discover which hotels are doing what in terms of environmental friendliness.
In fact, some 3,400 hotels in the United States now display in-room cards that offer guests the option of reusing their linens to cut down on environmental costs associated with excessive laundering. The 18-month-old initiative is a joint effort by the American Hotel and Motel Association and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
A similar program is maintained by the Green Hotels Association (GHA), which also offers a website listing eco-friendly hotels. Chains represented include Best Western, Doubletree, Ramada, Radisson, Sheraton and Hyatt. GHA also offers meeting planners a questionnaire to help discern a hotel's "greenness."
Such guides aside, however, you can count on the fact that most major hotel chains have some sort of environmental conservation policy.
Marriott Hotels, for example, has a broad environmental policy addressing waste management and utility conservation in effect at all 1,400 properties. Its Miami Dadeland Marriott, for instance, has 38 environmentally-controlled "green" rooms featuring low-flow shower heads, energy-efficient lighting, and state-of-the-art filtration systems to purify air and drinking water.
At the Four Seasons chain, most of its 37 hotels around the world now recycle glass, kitchen oil/grease, and metal cans. And at the Inter-Continental's 44 North American properties, each guest room is stocked with environmentally-conscious bathroom amenities, including vegetable-based soaps and packaging made from recycled materials. In addition, your newspapers and laundry no longer usually arrive shrouded in plastic.
The Inter-Continental's grande dame, the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., has installed energy-efficient lighting and a computer-controlled heating system that monitors energy use. Its wooden hangers were purchased from a company that has a reforestation program and its chi-chi stationery is made from recycled paper.
Although hotels generally realize great cost savings from such initiatives, chains say they are also responding to the demands of business travelers. Many groups have made recycling initiatives a prerequisite for signing on, says Ritz-Carlton's vice president of engineering, Ed Marvine.
Tom Riegelman, Hyatt Hotels Corporation's vice president of engineering, agrees. Says Riegelman: "Guests respond positively to our environmental efforts."
But whether guests start to miss their super-crisp towels and super-saturating showers remains for hotels to find out.
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