ENERGY EFFICIENT OPERATIONAL MEASURES IN HOTELS IN SINGAPORE

Abstract

With increased technological reliance all over the world, energy consumption has risen drastically, leading to global warming. Today, the Building and Construction Authority (BCA) of Singapore has put in place measures to ensure that buildings in Singapore are green. For example, the Green Mark Scheme encourages building owners and developers to build sustainable buildings. However, in order for a building to be truly sustainable, both the infrastructure and the operations of the building must be energy efficient. In Singapore today, while much focus is placed on improving infrastructures, there seems to be a lack of focus in ensuring sustainable operations. Hotels contribute significantly to total energy consumption in Singapore. This paper seeks to provide insights to the operations and processes within a hotel that contribute significantly to energy consumption. Energy efficient operational measures commonly used were also identified and studied to determine their feasibility in hotels in Singapore through extensive literature review, industrial interviews and questionnaire surveys. These measures will then be ranked based on their level of effectiveness and receptiveness by hotel guests. This list serves to balance effectiveness with receptiveness, which is crucial due to the nature of the industry, where guest satisfaction is of paramount importance. Interviews were also conducted with six individuals with extensive experiences, and are influential in the hotel industry. These interviews allowed for a more in-depth understanding of hotel operations and the energy efficient operational measures implemented and suggested. Through the interviews, measures that are not applicable to hotels in Singapore were identified and eliminated from further study. After the evaluation of data collected through the questionnaires, the final 18 measures were then ranked, generating a list of measures that are both effective to different extents, and generally well received by guests. The most effective measures may be less well received by guests. Therefore, it is crucial to find the balance between the two. iii A discrepancy between guests’ actual level of receptiveness and hoteliers’ impression of guests’ level of receptiveness towards various factors was also observed. What hoteliers deem unacceptable to shoppers was instead relatively well received by guests as reflected in survey results. Therefore, this paper serves to mitigate misconceptions and allow hoteliers to have a better understanding of guests’ level of receptiveness. This will greatly aid the evaluation of measures when determining measures to implement within their facility.