Global hospitality and hotel brands company IHG Hotels & Resorts announced today the launch the Low Carbon Pioneers program, featuring hotels across its brands meeting sustainability attributes including energy efficiency and no fossil-fuel combustion on site.

According to IHG, the launch comes as more hotel guests consider sustainability and look to reduce environmental impact, noting that almost all of the company’s top global corporate accounts are setting net-zero or carbon-neutral targets, with the new program supporting corporate clients looking to meet their own sustainable travel commitments.

Elie Maalouf, CEO of IHG Hotels & Resorts, said:

“We are excited to launch our Low Carbon Pioneers programme as another innovative way in which we’re meeting evolving guest expectations, helping our hotel owners future-proof their businesses and reducing carbon across our estate.”

The new program will include two levels of “Low Carbon Pioneers,” depending on whether a hotel can be fully backed by renewable energy, including “Low Carbon Hotels” that are energy efficient hotels, with no fossil fuels combusted onsite, other than backup generators, and are fully backed by renewable energy, and “Low Carbon Ready Hotels” that are also energy efficient and with no fossil fuels combusted onsite, and with optimized renewable energy, but are in locations where they are not able to procure offsite renewable energy or are mandated to join a district heating or cooling network.

The first hotels in the program include Holiday Inn Express Madrid Airport Iberostar Waves Cristina in Spain, and Kimpton BEM in Budapest, Hungary. Each Low Carbon Pioneer hotel will offer sustainable features such as high-efficiency heat pumps for heating and hot water generation and fully electric kitchens. Every property will also be expected to earn an operational sustainability certification recognized by the Global Sustainable Tourism Council. These might include Green Key, or a sustainable building certification, such as LEED, BREEAM or EDGE. Low Carbon Pioneer hotels will use IHG’s Green Engage environmental platform to track and measure their energy data.

IHG said that the new program will help the company to test sustainability measures in its properties, and that it will share its findings from the pilot program in the hope of encouraging wider adoption of carbon reduction practices.

Maalouf added:

“This is an important next step in IHG’s sustainability journey but it remains one of many we must continue to take. Accelerating change at scale for both IHG and the wider industry also requires broader support from governments ranging from greater access to renewable energy and incentives for owners, to a reduction in the cost of technology that speeds up the industry’s transition to a greener, more resilient future. IHG is committed to working with industry bodies and governments to help achieve this, alongside encouraging more owners to adopt carbon reduction practices and become Low Carbon Pioneers.”