London’s five-star Dorchester receives high honors for being green

This year’s inaugural Green500 and Better Buildings Partnership awards saw the city of London’s greenest lodging and lifestyle brands receive commendation by London Mayor Boris Johnson. The awards were handed out to organizations ranging from travel, sports, arts, education, transport and more.

Making the final cut of recipients was The Dorchester Hotel, one of London’s most fabulous and luxurious boutique hotels.

“Since we developed an environment policy a few years ago, we’ve been very committed to reducing our carbon footprint and other Corporate Social Responsibility objectives,” said Andy Churchill, Chief Engineer of the Dorchester. “Our new hotel, 45 Park Lane, will be open next year and we’ll then also be able to share and improve our overall contribution.”

The Dorchester, located on Park Lane overlooking Hyde Park, is well-known for being one of the world’s greatest hotels, with three staff members for every guest. It is a full blown 5 star deluxe hotel offering high end accommodation and is the chosen lodging of many international celebrities.

The hotel is just a five minute walk from Hyde Park Corner underground station, with Bond Street, Piccadilly, and Oxford Street on the doorstep.

The hotel’s wide range of green efforts include:

• Committment to a green purchasing scheme buying more and more goods and services from local sustainable-aware suppliers – even changing their landscape gardening company to one who specifies a sustainable service.
• Carbon-emission reduction on three cooling towers and three turbo core chillers which, apart from minimixing impacts, will also deliver better and more reliable air conditioning and cooling services to guests.
• Transformed lighting to low energy lighting with 33% now covered, to roll out throughout the establishment shortly.

Both Green500 and Better Buildings programs are funded by the London Development Agency to help deliver the Mayor’s target to cut London’s emissions by 60 per cent by 2025, create green collar jobs and stimulate a low carbon economy.

Together, over the last year, their 200 members have saved a massive 117,000 tons of carbon, equivalent to taking 100 double-decker buses off London’s streets.

For more information, visit www.thedorchester.com.