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Japan’s well recognized “Eco Mark” Certificate
Keio Plaza Hotel Tokyo has acquired the “Eco Mark” certification as a hotel facility that meets the environmental standard on September 26, 2022. The Eco Mark certification standard is based on environmental measures such as energy saving, water saving, and waste reduction at hotels and inns in Japan.
The Shinjuku-Shintoshin area where the Keio Plaza Hotel is built used to be the location of a water purification facility. Before the area was filled with skyscrapers, the Yodobashi Purification Plant supported the lives of Tokyo residents for 67 years up to 1965. Currently, the third basement floor of the Keio Plaza Hotel houses a waste-water recycling plant that purifies it using biological methods. This water is then reused within the hotel for flushing toilets and other tasks.
Plant-derived oils used in cooking are recycled and turned into soap, which is then used in all hand-wash stations in the hotel’s backyard and some of the customer toilets. In addition to reducing waste, we are also striving to establish reuse cycles by purchasing soap made from waste food oil.
◆Replacing Plastic Straws with biodegradable materials
We in principle eliminate use of plastic straws and replace them with biodegradable straws at its four hotels located in Shinjuku, Tama, Hachioji and Sapporo effective from 2018. This move reflects our concern for the global movement to reduce the amount of plastics which wind up polluting the oceans by eliminating use of plastic straws and is part of our various efforts of our Hotel Group to protect the environment.
◆Rooftop Garden
As an effective measure for the urban heat island effect, we created the large-scale greening of the roof on the 7th floor of the main building in 2008.
The amount of energy that our rooftop greenery reduces the urban heat island effect by is equivalent to an average of 145,000kcal an hour, which is 75 air-conditioner units running continuously in 15 ㎡ rooms for 3 months during July to September (summer). Keio Plaza Hotel’s rooftop garden contributes positively to the environment through beautiful and pleasant greenery.
When the hotel first opened, the Keio Plaza Hotel’s windows were designed based on the concept of “windows that enable the guests to enjoy a view as beautiful as a painting,” so they were made fairly big compared to usual hotel standards. As a result, the windows of the rooms on the west side of the hotel tend to get hot when the sun is in the west. Therefore, in 2003 we attached UV-ray blocking film to the windows of all rooms on the west side of the hotel to prevent them from getting too hot. This also led to energy savings, as the rooms are more efficient to cool.
Guests who are staying consecutive nights can use a card to show they do not need their towels and sheets changing and then use the same ones the next day. Previously, these were changed every day when the room was cleaned. However, at the request of guests we trialed this initiative in some of our guest rooms, and as many of our guests agreed with the idea, we have now extended it to cover all rooms.
The luscious and magnificent greenery, consisting of a variety of trees, can be enjoyed from the large ceiling-to-floor panorama windows designed and planted in 1971, by the self-proclaimed “Outdoor Space Creator,” landscape guru, Koki Fukaya. The Greenery at Jurin was selected as part of “Shinjuku’s 30 Greenery Selection.” In the garden, there is a natural stone promenade, and deciduous trees such as East Asian oak trees, Japanese elm trees, Japanese maple trees, which produce comforting sounds of nature as the wind sways their leaves. Keio Plaza Hotel is supporting the creation of a “green curtain” by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Bureau of the Environment.
