Ali Al Jassim, CEO of Etihad Energy Services Company, Etihad ES, has predicted that the Dubai’s Sustainable Tourism initiative will actively contribute to the broader clean energy and sustainable development targets set by the Dubai Government.

Al Jassim was speaking at the Dubai Green Hotel Innovation conference on Thursday.

Etihad ES, Taqati and Dubai Energy Efficiency Programme participated in the event as supporting partners, encouraging the industry to adopt energy-efficient solutions.

Ali Al Jassim officially opened the 2017 edition of the Dubai Green Hotel Innovation conference, which brought together key stakeholders of Dubai’s hospitality industry to discuss and explore currently available technologies and solutions that can help promote sustainability and provide dependable benchmarks against international standards.

The conference also drew attention to industry best practices and the latest innovations aimed at reducing operating costs and improving performance through sustainability and retrofitting programmes.

A presentation by Executive Director of Taqati, Aref Abou Zahr, focussed on the "Demand Side Management, DSM, Applications for Hotels" to help assets understand different methods to reduce energy consumption in their facilities. It also highlighted the important role of the hotel sector in achieving energy consumption reduction targets of 30 percent by 2030.

Methods to achieve energy efficiency in Dubai hotels include adherence to green building regulations for new facilities, retrofitting for existing hotels, district cooling, standards and labels for appliances, water reuse and efficient irrigation, distributed solar energy and green procurement practice.

Dubai is investing in the hotel sector with 300 hotels in the pipeline to open before 2020, adding to approximately 700 hotels currently operating in Dubai. Hence, the environmental impact of the sector from natural resource usage is set to rise. With plans to host 20 million tourists a year by 2020, there is the rising importance of having strong environmental measures and sustainability strategies for Dubai’s hotel sector.

A number of hotels have achieved savings through the implementation of such eco-friendly initiatives. An example will be Kempinski Hotel Ajman, which currently saves US$1,360 a day by recycling water for irrigation. A solar panel installation to heat water saves $5,445 a month in diesel costs.

Hotels are also investing in innovative energy-efficient solutions to achieve reduced operating costs and improve sustainable performance through new build and retrofitting.

The 2nd Annual Dubai Green Tourism Hotel Innovation will see discussions on the Dubai green tourism programme updates and initiatives as well as best practices and the latest technology for reducing operating costs and improving sustainable performance through sustainability and retrofitting programmes.