Assessment of practices and technologies of energy saving and renewable energy sources in hotels in Crete Nikolaos Zografakis a, * , Konstantinos Gillas b , Antrianna Pollaki b , Maroulitsa Profylienou b , Fanouria Bounialetou b , Konstantinos P. Tsagarakis c a Regional Energy Agency of Crete, Region of Crete, 71202 Heraklion, Greece b Department of Economics, University of Crete, University Campus, 74100 Rethymno, Greece c Department of Environmental Engineering, Democritus University of Thrace, 67100 Xanthi, Greece article info Article history: Received 3 September 2009 Accepted 22 October 2010 Available online 26 November 2010 Keywords: Energy efficiency Energy saving Hotels Renewable energy sources Sustainable tourism abstract This study aims to assess the state of the art of practices and technologies of energy saving and renewable energy sources in hotels. This will contribute to determining the potential of efficient and sustainable energy technologies integration. Hotel managers were interviewed face to face and infor- mation sessions were provided. Special energy and environmental awareness campaigns, sectoral tourism programs for climate change mitigation and adaptation, supportive policies and hotel energy investments and renovation programs are some recommendations elicited from the results of this study. Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Tourism and environment should be managed in an integrated and interdisciplinary way [1]. Growing global environmental concerns are dictating the adoption of environmental friendly policies for tourism industry. Although there are some very well- known tools aiming at environmental protection and sustainability, i.e. EMAS, ISO 14001, eco-labels, etc. [2], the question of how to achieve sustainable tourism remains an object of debate. It is clear that for tourism to be sustainably developed, environmental impacts need to be kept below critical threshold levels, which can only be achieved if these can be quantified [3]. Dalton et al. [4] support that Green House Gas (GHG) emissions produced by hotels can be reduced by: implementation of energy efficiency measures and/or production of power by renewable energy supply initiatives and technologies. Hotels are ranked among the largest energy consumers in tertiary building sector. Compared to demolition and reconstruc- tion, renovation is usually financially attractive and also offers great opportunities for promotion of energy efficient measures, exploi- tation of renewable energy sources (RES) and rational use of energy (RUE) in the hotel sector [5]. There is a lot of room for cost reduction and competitive prices achievement in hotel energy consumption. Growing awareness of environmental factors in hotel design and operation, is leading to the introduction of elements and processes with less environmental impacts, which help to create conditions favorable to the optimization of energy resources and the intro- duction of Renewable Energy Technologies (RETs) [6]. Furthermore, the adoption of energy saving applications in hotels shall give them a comparative advantage of environmental performance [7]. Electricity is the primary form of energy used in hotels mainly for air-conditioning, space and water heating, lighting, lifts, kitchen equipment, etc. [7] while natural gas, diesel and coal, only play a minor role [8]. Ali et al. [9] report that electricity used for running air conditioning systems corresponds approximately to 30% or more of total expenditures of energy consumption. According, however, to Santamouris et al. [10] air-conditioning systems increase the annual energy consumption by 29e77%, depending on the type of system. Daskalaki and Balaras [5] report that in European hotels, 61% of the energy is consumed by space heating, cooling and ventilation, 25% by services and 15% by hot water production. About half of the European hotel buildings are located in the Mediterranean countries. An important characteristic of the Mediterranean hotels is that they are located in areas with high * Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: enrg_bur@crete-region.gr (N. Zografakis), gillask@gmail.com (K. Gillas), antrianna.p@gmail.com (A. Pollaki), m.profylienou@gmail.com (M. Profylienou), fani.bounialetou@gmail.com (F. Bounialetou), kandila@her. forthnet.gr (K.P. Tsagarakis). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Renewable Energy journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/renene 0960-1481/$ e see front matter Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.renene.2010.10.015 Renewable Energy 36 (2011) 1323e1328