Cornell Hotel Sustainability Benchmarking Index

November 2021 - The Cornell Hotel Sustainability Benchmarking (CHSB) Index is a global data collection and benchmarking initiative that provides the hotel industry's most extensive information on energy, water, and carbon performance. The index allows a hotel to benchmark its performance against peers in the same city, climate zone, or asset class, and serves as the primary reference tool for governments or companies to calculate the environmental impact of a hotel stay. Participants in the CHSB index include major hotel brands, operators, and owners, representing all regions of the world. The eighth annual report of the Cornell Hotel Sustainability Benchmarking study, published in September 2021, presents the results of the analysis of the 2019 calendar-year data. A total of 21,432 hotels from 26 international hotel chains participated by contributing information regarding their energy and water usage. Over 60% of the total data comes from hotels in the United States. This year's study finds a general reduction in energy and water usage among the participating hotels over the past three years (2017 -2019).

Study Findings

Overall, data from the latest CHSB Index shows that the average carbon footprint of a hotel stay decreased by 3% between 2018 and 2019, following a decrease of 10% between 2015 and 2018.

Energy Intensity

Energy intensity has reduced 3.30% on average since 2017, with 0.41% of overall reduction recorded from 2017 to 2018 and 3.09% of overall reduction from 2018 to 2019. This reduction varied based on limited-service hotels versus full-service hotels. In limited-service hotels, energy usage increased slightly in 2018 by 0.93% on average yet reduced significantly in 2019 by 3.02% on average. In contrast, energy usage per square meter among all full-service hotels has declined since 2017 by 3.69% on average.

Water Usage Intensity

The water intensity of the like-for-like data set has reduced consistently since 2017. The overall average of water usage per occupied room has reduced 3.73% since 2017. Water usage per occupied room of full-service hotels has reduced by 3.91% overall, and limited-service hotels recorded an overall average reduction of 3.79% since 2017.

How You Can Use the Index

The index allows hotel operators to benchmark their performance against peers and provides a basis based on city, region, country, or climate zone. Additionally, it provides aggregated datasets which help users set relevant targets and monitor their progress against them. CHSB data can be used by individual hotels, hotel companies, or other interested parties, such as corporate customers or travel managers, to benchmark hotel energy, carbon, and water performance. Hotel owners and operators can find where their property falls in the energy range, then analyze what drivers are causing their hotel's ratings (whether those factors are controllable or uncontrollable). For example, the data indicates that hotels located in areas where renewable energy is being adopted at a faster rate have much lower carbon intensity.The 2021 CHSB Index shows that the hotel industry has been on a robust pathway to reduce emissions from its operations for several years. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the hotel and travel industries were among the hardest hit. However, as travel recovers, this year's study (tracking hotel data through 2019) provides definitive pre-COVID benchmarks for energy, water, and carbon performance.

Estimate the Carbon Footprint of a Hotel Stay

Data from the CHSB powers the free Hotel Footprinting Tool which can be accessed at www.hotelfootprints.org. Using the tool, it is possible to estimate the carbon footprint of a hotel stay or meeting anywhere in the world, based on the location and class of hotel. This can help estimate the footprint of a trip or a meeting, or to compare equivalent hotel types in different destinations.Due to the impact of COVID-19 on the hotel sector in 2020, the CHSB Index will not be published in 2022, but will resume in 2023 with an analysis of 2021 performance. Companies wishing to benchmark their 2019 performance against the dataset may continue to do this at www.greenview.sg/chsb-index.