As many of you may know, today is Earth Day – and here at Hyatt, we are committed to making a meaningful and positive impact on our environment.  

In honor of Earth Day, our hotels across the world have been doing their part to incorporate sustainability into their daily activities, as well as empower their local communities to make a real difference, including:

• Grand Hyatt Sao Paulo launched a campaign among associates to collect cooking oil to be recycled. Not only were they able to collect 90 liters of cooking oil in just one month, but it inspired associates to tell their friends and neighbors how recycling cooking oil can help keep water resources clean.
• Hyatt Regency Bellevue has an annual partnership with a local nonprofit, and volunteers on a quarterly basis to remove invasive species, plant trees and shrubs, and supporting other preservation efforts at Cedar River Watershed.
• At Hyatt Regency Delhi, more than 200 associates have pledged to pick up at least 10 pieces of litter each month and spread awareness as part of the "Let's do it Delhi" city initiative.
• As part of a recycling campaign, Grand Hyatt Dubai recycled an impressive 60 kilograms (130 pounds) of Tetra Pak containers in just one month. The associates, along with other groups that recycled large quantities, were then invited to plant a tree in Mushrif Park.

As an organization, we are constantly working to improve our own environmental practices, and we've made some great strides in this area by:

Creating a platform for global engagement. Employee engagement is critical to launching successful programs, and we provide opportunities for our associates to take ownership of environmental efforts by setting up Green Teams at their hotels and providing Hyatt Earth Training materials – a series of three workshops totaling six hours on environmental awareness, energy, water, and waste.  Equipped with knowledge and a forum for planning, the Green Team members create initiatives to reduce environmental impact and raise awareness.

Measuring our impact and setting goals that align with our business. Tracking and setting goals are also essential for driving progress.  At Hyatt, we use an online database called Hyatt EcoTrack to measure our performance around energy and water consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, and waste generation by hotel, brand, and region.  With this information, we've established company-wide goals for 2015, including:

• Reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions per square meter by 25% from 2006 levels. 
• Reduce water consumption per guest night by 20% from 2006 levels.
• Reduce waste generation per guest night by 25% from 2010 levels.

Hotels align their efforts with these goals and track their own progress. For example, Grand Hyatt Dubai installed one of the largest solar panel systems in the Middle East to generate energy for heating water, and was able to achieve a 33% reduction in diesel fuel consumption. 

Initiating action by creating incentives to align associate actions with goals. Once there is engagement and goals, it is important to maintain focus around action items.  Some approaches may include integrating departmental or associate environmental goals into incentives, such as performance reviews, recognition in monthly staff meetings, or a friendly competition.

For example, the Green Team at the Hyatt corporate office in Chicago launched the "Paper Thin Challenge" in 2010, a competition among office floors to reduce paper use. The challenge resulted in an overall 30% reduction in 2010 paper use compared to 2009, and the team was able to donate the cost savings of about $22,000 to a local nonprofit, Friends of the Parks (FOTP), to support the preservation of Chicago Parks and youth environmental education. Plus, as an extension of our work with FOTP, associates, friends and family from the corporate office and Park Hyatt Chicago gathered Saturday, April 16 at Humboldt Park for a beautification project, which included mulching and picking up litter – check out our Hyatt Friday photos below from this special day!

We hope everyone enjoys Earth Day and uses it as a great opportunity to remind themselves what they can do to protect the environment each and every day.