Page 25 - The 10 Most Innovative Green Energy Startups 2019

respectively.
Hotels like Le Méridien in New Delhi, Accor Hotels’ Ibis in
Gurugram, and Hilton Shillim in Pune have installed rooftop
solar plants for captive power consumption on their own
premises. Due to the rising power prices, the hospitality industry
is also resorting to captive off-site and open access power
procurement of renewable energy to lower their operating
expenses. Recently, the Oberoi Group’s Gurugram properties,
Trident and Oberoi, switched to renewables and started
procuring solar power from a 7.5 MW captive solar plant in
Balasar, Haryana. Two large hotels in Jaipur, Le Méridien
Resort & Spa and Hilton, source solar power through open
access from 1.3 MWp and 2 MWp solar parks, respectively
located in Gajner, Rajasthan. The hotels save roughly 1.5
MUs and 2 MUs of energy per month respectively, leading to
significant reductions in their power bills.
In the southern part of the country, wind power is the preferred
renewable energy source for the hospitality industry, with many
large hotels procuring huge quantities of cheap wind power through
the open access or captive route. For instance, ITC Grand Chola in
Chennai gets most of its power from a captive wind power plant in
Coimbatore. The hotel also produces biodiesel from organic waste
to power its heat pumps and boilers. ITC’s other properties like
ITC Maratha in Mumbai, and ITC Windsor and Royal Gardenia
in Bengaluru meet almost their entire power consumption through
captive wind farms. Other major hotels like the Leela Palace in
Bengaluru, Oberoi in Bengaluru, Residency Towers in Chennai and
Taj Coromandel in Chennai also procure significant wind power
capacity. In fact, Vivanta by Taj in Coimbatore meets more than 80
per cent of its total power requirements through wind power.
The way forward
As of today, ITC Limited’s hotels in total meet more than 58 per
cent of their electricity requirements through renewable energy
sources such as wind and solar. In 2017-18, Indian Hotels Company
Limited, with its flagship brand, Taj, met 21.75 per cent of the
total energy consumption of 60 hotels through renewable energy
sources. Both ITC Limited and Indian Hotels Company Limited are
expanding their solar and wind energy footprint. Other large hotel
chains like Marriott International and Hyatt Hotels Corporation are
also exploring renewable energy solutions as part of their corporate
strategy. In fact, Mahindra Holidays & Resorts India Limited has
committed to join RE 100, a global renewable energy campaign led
by The Climate Group. It has also set a target to power 100 per cent
of its global operations with renewable electricity by 2050.

Renewable energy is expected to form a major part of the
corporate strategy of hospitality companies as they strive to
cut their operating costs and attract environmentally conscious
youth travellers. In fact, hospitality is expected to emerge as
a key stand-alone business segment for solar and wind power
developers, and operations and maintenance service providers,
leading to the development of innovative business models.
Renewable integration with the use of energy storage systems
may gain prominence in this space as quality and uninterrupted
power is of utmost importance for hotels. Going forward, it will
be interesting to see how renewable energy systems transform
the hotel and hospitality landscape of the country.