The company's decarbonization challenge is set to be achieved over the next 5 years
Lopesan Hotel Group has invested 50 million euros since 2019 in its commitment to promoting renewable energies
The wind farms and photovoltaic plots confirm the main axis of the green policies implemented by the Group, obtaining a total annual production that exceeds 100 Gwh
The determined commitment to sustainable development and green policies implemented by Lopesan Hotel Group, in the last four years, have focused the discourse of the professional meetings held during the first day of the W.
The Lopesan Group values sustainability not only as a competitive advantage, but also understands that the activation of actions associated with environmental protection constitutes a true necessity, which must make a difference and which directly influences the final choice of each guest, he highlighted. the CEO of Lopesan Hotel Group, Francisco López. In this sense, "the company's commitment to a sustainable business model is definitive and non-negotiable, setting the goal of decarbonizing the company in the next 5 years."
The President of the Government of the Canary Islands, Fernando Clavijo, and the Minister of Tourism and Employment, Isabel León, had the opportunity to learn first-hand about the work being carried out by Lopesan Hotel Group at the fair, not only in terms of tourism development from a sustainable perspective, but in the strictest commercial sense, working to cement new commercial alliances in the United Kingdom and make the most of the boom experienced by the British market in Gran Canaria.
The professional suppliers who were completing the meeting agenda during the start of the World Travel Market praised the new image shown by the stand of Lopesan Hotel Group, pointing out that the elegant design chosen, as well as the natural materials that shape the space, such as wood, stone and lush vegetation, perfectly define the aesthetic values that the company represents in the tourism sector. .
The president of the Cabildo of Gran Canaria, Antonio Morales, and the Minister of Tourism, Carlos Álamo, had an interesting conversation with the CEO of Lopesan Hotel Group, Francisco López, the general director of the Hotel Division, José Alba, and the president of LS Invest AG (IFA Group), Santiago de Armas, in which they analyzed the company's growth strategy based on environmental care and the reduction of the carbon footprint generated by tourism activity.
Some of the sustainable projects that are defined in the Lopesan Group's roadmap are designed so that their application can be extrapolated to the company's 22 assets, from the smallest property to the largest complex and regardless of the destination in which they are located. find. “The 2022 sustainability report indicates that the Lopesan Group invested more than 4,3 million in environmental actions, managing to generate 2.8 million KWh of renewable energy and reducing its carbon footprint by 60% compared to the previous year,” Francisco pointed out. Lopez.
Sustainability is one of the main axes of the company's Corporate Social Responsibility policies, understanding each of them as a model of change and transversal transformation, which must serve to prepare the organization for future decision-making. in the areas of governance, social issues and environmental care.
The tourism industry has a direct impact on all the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by the 2030 Agenda of the United Nations (UN), which is why Lopesan Hotel Group has carried out the exercise of vectorizing which records most affect measure, to the environments in which the hotel activity is carried out. Once they have been detected, the Lopesan Group has proposed formulas to try to reduce the environmental impact as much as possible, promote the circular economy and minimize social factors.
Back to the origin
Aware of the high volume of energy consumed by hotel activity, the Lopesan Group launched a plan in 2019 called Road to Next 0, which sought to return to the origin of the problem to achieve energy efficiency and obtain an immediate return on the bottom line.
In these four years, the company has invested more than 50 million euros in the creation of new renewable energy production plants, in which wind farms and photovoltaic plots have been the main protagonists, obtaining a total annual production that exceeds the 100 Gwh. In detail, the implementation of solar plants on the roofs of hotels (0,6 Mw), solar farms (8 Mw) and wind farms (32 Mw) translates into a renewable energy mix of 85% wind and 14% photovoltaic.
The efforts made by the Lopesan Group to achieve greater energy efficiency are summarized in a resounding fact: in 2019, only 1% of the energy consumed by its hotels had a renewable origin, while in 2024, thanks to the production of green energy from the new plants, an increase of 210% is planned, a figure well above real consumption. The volatility of the energy market has caused the return on investment, expected over 8 years, to be reduced by 40%.
The Lopesan Group's future plans involve continuing to invest in deferred, non-localized renewable energy, since it is impossible to depend on the facilities that can be mounted on the roofs of the hotels, which are clearly insufficient, the general director pointed out. Jose Alba. This formula, which the company is committed to, is the only one that guarantees that the production curve and the demand curve operate in parallel and also contribute to the decarbonization of the destination.
