Every day we hear more and more people paying exorbitant amounts of money to travel to other planets. They are looking for a place to move when planet earth is uninhabitable. Each person must raise awareness and common sense to preserve this planet on which we live.
We need the temperature to drop at least ½ degree before 2030. If we don’t make it, the next generations will suffer many diseases such as cancer, respiratory diseases, among many others that are caused by pollution.
Dramatic changes are urgent to avoid a global catastrophe.
Good practices no matter how simple they seem are important and necessary protect the environment. Things that we can do in our daily lives:
When traveling, choose an eco-friendly or eco-sustainable hotels.
These types of hotels carry out many practices to protect the environment:
- Dispensers for liquid soap, shampoo and hair conditioner are installed to prevent so many used soap bars from reaching landfills, as well as plastic containers.
Do you know what happens to that half-used bar of soap? They are thrown away.Some studies indicate that, approximately 5 million bars of soap are thrown away each day. The Global Soap Project estimates that the hotel industry in the United States throws approximately 2.6 million bars of soap into landfills daily.The impact of these soaps and their packages that are deposited in landfills are causing environmental problems for many reasons.They bring problems to the communities near them, but they also bring problems to other areas. Landfills fill up with containers, unused soap when rains reach the rivers and from there to the sea damaging marine life, killing species.
- Initially we talked about soaps, but I find hard to believe that one person chooses a hotel because the hotel gives a customer a bar of soap or a little pot of shampoo or conditioner. Do you like the shampoo and conditioner offered in most of the hotels? I don’t know if it’s me, but my hair doesn’t seem to like these shampoos.Generally, those products don’t work on my hair.
Now, I always carry a small bottle of shampoo and a small bottle of my favorite conditioner, which I refill every time I travel.
Most of the time we open those bottles, and we don’t like them and throw them away without using them.
- Changing towels and sheets every other day. Why if we don’t change the sheets and towels daily at home do we want hotels changed them every day in our stay? In our houses we do not change bed linen and towels daily. Is it too hard to stretch the towels after each use to dry them so they can be reused? In my opinion, yes, we can. It doesn’t mean that we must use towels and sheets for a long time, or if we have an accident, ask for room service.Using the same towels and bed linen for two or three days helps a lot.
- All our air conditions are inverters with at least 21 SER. We set the room temperature to 70 Fahrenheit degrees. This temperature is ideal an helps the environment. We also have motion detectors in the rooms, if no one is inside the room the AC will turn off in an hour.We understand that in a hotel as we are paying, we do not have to economize.
Because we pay, we leave the air conditioning or the heater on, or the lights 24-7, because it does not cost us, or we pay for it. What is false, the environment is passing the bill to us and future generations. If hotel’s cost increase, room rates increase also.
Let’s be conscious, let’s turn things off before leaving the room. Why we turn the heater so hot, and then we leave a window or a door open because is too hot? Please help.
- Eco-friendly hotels try to maintain a comfortable temperature but not to the extreme of hot or cold. There are many people who go to a hotel and want to set the temperature to 62 degrees Fahrenheit, and then ask for extra comforters because the room is freezing. You understand that it would be smart to raise the temperature of the room a little. I emphasize again that if we are not considerate with the hotel, we will pay for it in the short or long run.The same thing happens with the heating system, we see customers who raise the temperature of the heating system and open the doors and windows of the room, because it’s too hot.
- Buffets. It’s sad to see people that visit restaurants in hotels, especially those that are all-inclusive, or cruises, and they take a portion of each plate of the menu and then throw the food away because was too much. Two things happen, over time the hotel increases the room rates, and there is unnecessary food waste.How many people die each day due to lack of food? At a time when water already began to become scarce. Producing food is increasingly difficult. We must create awareness.
- Swimming pools. many love to spend a whole day in the pool but they don’t go to the bathroom, and they urinate in it. This results in the transmission of diseases, wasting additional money, chemicals on disinfection. I have a friend who is dedicated to verifying the cleanliness of swimming pools, and the PH of them.This person tells me that he doesn’t bathe in one no matter what. He says that a swimming pool is like a public toilet, with the bacteria it has.
But if we would cooperate it would be much easier for everyone if and these things would not happen.
There are other practices that green hotels do:
- Biodegradable detergents are used for cleaning and laundry.
- Inverter and high SER air conditioners are used.
- Solar heaters and solar panels are used.
- Laundry is washed with cold water.
- Thinner towels are purchased to reduce drying time.
- Sometimes clothes are hung out in the sun to avoid dryers.
- Roofs are painted reflective white to lower the temperature of the structures.
- The exterior paint of the rooms is light-colored to reduce the heat in the rooms.
- The windows are white to reduce the heat entering the rooms. And double curtains are used to decrease the temperature.
- Motion sensors are used on the corridor’s lamps, that they turn off when there is no one in the corridors.
- Air conditioners are not turned-on on corridors. Cross ventilation is preferred.
- The garbage left by guests is recycled as much as possible.
- Sometimes guest leaves cloths, sandals, and belongings, we give them to Red Cross organization. What one throws away because it is useless, another picks it up because it is useful.
- Rainwater is collected for watering plants and washing outdoor areas.
Many other practices are implemented that people sometimes do not understand why, but each initiative helps to conserve the environment and the planet that belongs to everyone.
Whether at the hotel or in our homes, let’s not buy a 12-ounce bottle of water, let’s buy a gallon and use a reusable cup. Even better is to buy the 5-gallon container and fill our reusable container every time we need water. We can do the same thing with soft drinks.
Sometimes we use the car to go to the corner when we can walk. Let’s start sponsoring mass transit, bicycles, scooters.
Let’s plant a tree every time we can, preferably a fruit tree. If we all plant trees and harvest part of what we eat, we help the environment with CO2, but at the same time we prepare ourselves for times of scarcity.
Trees help us with oxygen, and at the same time it is a therapy to spend a little time watering them and giving them affection. On a balcony we can harvest peppers, garlic, lettuce that we can use in our kitchen.
I have a friend who cut in half 55-gallons plastic drums and planted on his roof, bananas, pumpkins, tomatoes, oranges, pineapples, and he does very well. And it is a normal sized house, three-bedroom house, not a farm.
Let’s not leave the car running when we are waiting for someone, sometimes just by lowering the windows, the temperature is nice, and we don’t have to burn fuel. And even better if you can buy an electric car that you can connect to solar panels would be even better.
Every initiative helps our lives and the lives of our loved ones. We want our children to have a place to live, clean air, that they do not lack water that is so essential no water. That way they do not lack for food, that they will have clean air to breathe.
Perhaps you will say or think, why are we going to economize or deprive ourselves of doing this or that, when the big companies do not do anything.
What difference does what we do make if others do nothing?
First with my conscience, I’m happy to help. Second, if as I think, there are thousands or millions that do care and do their part will be plenty of people doing a bit.
Help us to spread the word, join the group of those who can and do not complain to make the change.
When you travel, remember that there are eco-friendly hotels that fight for a better environment. Your grain of sand is important.
If you are looking for an eco-friendly hotel in San Juan Puerto Rico, remember that Dreams Hotel Puerto Rico, Dreams Hotel Miramar and Aqua by Dreams are certified green hotels, where we care about the environment and we work hard to preserve it.
Book with us at 787-688-5818 or send us a message at dreampuertorico@gmail.com
We are waiting for you…