Accor unveiled its Carbon Optimiser for professional customers with an exclusive worldwide preview at the Imex Frankfurt trade show today. The tool will allow meeting and seminar organisers know and cut their events’ carbon footprint.

The trade show will end on May 24.

The Carbon Optimiser is interactive, user-friendly and combines a comprehensive set of variables, including the number of participants, the number of nights they plan to stay, how long the seminar will last, how big the meeting rooms are and the energy mix in the host country, a statement from the company said.

It also factors in food services, including the type of food and whether meals are buffets or table-served, the statement said.

Accor includes indirect emissions associated with organising seminars, like waste treatment, paper and, especially, food which is a substantial source of carbon emissions. This way, customers will be able to choose menus based on their carbon footprint, and adopt more responsible choices.

By the end of 2012, all Accor sales teams will have access to the tool to help their customers organise their seminars, it said.

It was developed by Accor to meet its professional customer expectations. The guest survey that the group ran in six countries and published in June 2011 revealed that 84 per cent of business customers are sensitive to sustainable development – compared to 76 per cent of all customers.

Business customers are also more aware of large business firms’ responsibilities and 57 per cent of them say that they take sustainable development into account when they choose a hotel – compared to 51 per cent of the total.

The environmental footprint report published by the group in December 2011 provided all the necessary databases to build the Optimiser, the statement said.

Ludovic Dupont, vice president, travel agencies, meetings & events, Accor, said: “Sustainable development is an opportunity for our customers and a decisive competitive advantage for our brand, in every country. I am convinced that our commitment creates the sort of perception that nurtures customer trust and loyalty to Accor.”

The Optimiser is one step towards achieving the goals of Planet 21, a new sustainable development programme that Accor launched last month.

Sophie Flak, executive vice president for academies and sustainable development, Accor, said: “The ambition of Planet 21 is to involve more customers in our continuous-improvement drive on the sustainable development front. The carbon optimiser, an innovative tool packed with completely new calculation variables, is a step in that direction. It will allow us to work with our professional customers to on sustainable offers for meetings and seminars in our hotels.”

Accor is a leading player in meetings and seminars, with venues in roughly 2,000 hotels. – TradeArabia News Service