Press Release: Sustainable and Competitive Hotels Through Energy Innovation - Nearly Zero Energy Hotels 2015
SUSTAINABLE AND COMPETITIVE HOTELS THROUGH ENERGY INNOVATION - NEARLY ZERO ENERGY HOTELS 2015
INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE
On June 24th, 2015, the European initiative Nearly Zero Energy Hotels (neZEH) organized in Nice (France) its 2015 international conference on the theme “Sustainable and competitive hotels through energy innovation”.
Gathering more than 100 attendees and followed by more than 300 people on webcast, the conference aimed at sharing challenges and opportunities of energy innovation through nearly zero energy strategies, as a means to enhance sustainability and competitiveness in theaccommodation industry.
The discussion evolved around the following topics: opportunities and challenges of nearly zero energy strategies in the hotel sector; demonstration of the feasibility of nearly zero energy hotels; transition from nearly zero energy building policies to sustainable tourism and cities; sustainability as a marketing opportunity in the hotel sector and the growing awareness in clients behavior.
Among the high level speakers were: ΕU Commission/EASME, UNWTO, HOTREC, UNEP, IFDD, TripAdvisor, the Center for Sustainable Development of the Government of Montenegro and many more. Moreover, three of the 16 neZEH pilot hotels: the Hotel Cubix (Romania), the Hotel Best Western Ajaccio Amirauté (France) and the Hotel Natural Resort Amalurra (Spain), shared their first steps and experiences in reaching neZEH status.
By bringing together two interrelated but generally separated sectors –tourism and the energy efficiency/building sector-, the event created a platform of exchange and inspiration for further work.
The Conference presentations and video recordings are available online at http://www.nezeh.eu/nezeh2015conference/presentations/index.html
The neZEH 2015 Conference was labelled as a Pre-COP21 event, as part of a whole week on “Sustainable buildings, cities and territories to face the challenges of climate change”.
The neZEH 2015 Conference was also labelled “Energy day” in the framework of the European Union Sustainable Energy Week (EUSEW), as a contribution to the exchanges and debates taking place throughout Europe.
The European initiative neZEH
neZEH is an EU-funded project which aims at accelerating the rate of large scale renovations of hotels into nearly zero energy buildings (nZEB), by:
providing technical advice to committed hoteliers and demonstrating flagship nZEB projects in the European hospitality sector. 16 Hotels in 7 European countries are already on their way to becoming neZEH. Find out more at www.nezeh.eu
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