Construction

Buildings account for 40% of the world's CO² emissions and 40% of its energy consumption.
The main items are heating, hot water and lighting. As Accor plans to open more than 1800 new hotels between 2008 and 2012, construction rules exist to reduce energy consumption and environmental impact.
Buildings built before 1975 consume on average 4 times more energy than those being built today.
Renovation is just as important as construction. Accor therefore analyzes the energy consumption of its hotels and identifies the investments needed to improve energy efficiency.

Accor 2010 objectives

1 - Build hotels in 2010 which consume 20% less water and energy than existing hotels.

In 2008, Accor defined its "international construction and renovation rules." These are designed to integrate a sustainable development dimension in all the Group's buildings.

In order to strengthen the implementation of the sustainable development rules for construction and renovation, the Group's technical standards for building insulation and energy recovery were updated in 2008.
Integration studies were defined and tested on several new construction and expansion projects: ibis Cotonou, ibis Brighton, Sofitel Ia Ora, etc. Starting from the design phase of a hotel, Accor wants to place greater emphasis on the limitations and opportunities of a location (for example, water resources, solar energy, soil pollution, etc.)
During construction in sensitive natural sites, Accor has detailed environmental studies conducted to minimize the negative impact of its hotels.
In 2006, Accor opened the Novotel Montparnasse in Paris, the first HQE hotel in France and a pioneering hotel in the sector.

The ibis Paris Porte de Clichy, which opened in 2004, is the very first hotel in France equipped with photovoltaic panels. These are directly integrated into the building architecture.

In Switzerland, the Novotel Lausanne was completely renovated with a number of environmental technologies.