Colombo Court Blog Sustainability
What a carbon neutral hotel actually does
Colombo Court was the first city hotel in South Asia to be certified CarbonNeutral. Here is what that means in our building and in how we run the hotel.
The term carbon neutral is used widely, and not always accurately, so it is worth explaining. Here is what it means for this building and for the way we run the hotel.
It started with not knocking anything down
Colombo Court was not built as a hotel. It was created by converting old office buildings, and keeping those buildings was the most important thing we did for our carbon footprint. A concrete frame contains a large amount of embodied carbon, and demolishing one to put up a new, more efficient building usually takes decades to pay back. So the existing frames were kept, and the rooms were fitted into the space that was already there. This is also why no two rooms are exactly the same shape.
What is in the building
Solar panels heat the water. All lighting is LED, which makes a real difference across thirty-one rooms and four public spaces. Rainwater is collected from the roofs, and water from the plunge pool and the laundry is recycled to water the garden instead of going down the drain. That is why the garden stays green even in February.
Drinking water is filtered and bottled in glass on site. This matters because a hotel of our size could otherwise use tens of thousands of plastic bottles a year. We only use plastic bottles in the occasional week when demand is higher than our bottling can supply.
The furniture and the art
Timber is reclaimed rather than newly felled, paper is recycled, and much of the art is made from scrap metal by Sri Lankan artists, including the tree above. These choices were part of the original plan: to create a hotel using as few new materials as possible.
The part that is offsetting
No hotel can operate with zero emissions. Air conditioning is essential in Colombo’s climate, guests arrive by air, and the kitchen uses gas. Carbon neutral certification means that the hotel’s remaining emissions are measured and then offset. Colombo Court was the first city hotel in South Asia to be certified CarbonNeutral.
Offsetting does not replace reducing emissions. That is why we continue to look for ways to use less energy and water every year.
What it asks of you
Very little. There is a card in the bathroom about reusing towels, and any towel left on the floor is replaced that day. Most of the important choices were built into the hotel itself, so our guests do not need to make them.
