Millennium Hotels and Resorts (MHR) has responded to the call to beat plastic pollution and pledged it will end the use of single-use plastics across its six hotels in Singapore. In joining the global fight against plastics, the hotel group will not only help save the environment by cutting out over 260kg of plastics per month, it will also see savings of nearly $500,000 a year that would have otherwise been spent on plastics.
The Singapore hotels – Orchard Hotel, Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel, M Hotel, Studio M, M Social and Copthorne King’s Hotel – will phase out the use of disposable plastics by June 2019 and opt for greener alternatives. This includes plastic straws, stirrers, plastic bags, cutlery and toiletry bottles in over 2,600 rooms.
Currently, M Social has replaced plastic straws with paper ones and are using environmentally-friendly packaging and cutlery for their ‘Order & Grab’ service. The other hotels in the Group are following suit to replace plastic straws and stirrers for room service and at their restaurants. In addition, Orchard Hotel and Studio M are also planning to use dispensers in hotel rooms for toiletries for their guests.
Mr Lee Richards, Vice President of Operations (South East Asia), MHR, said, “While the hotel industry benefits from the convenience of using plastic products, we see that it has long-lasting adverse impact on the environment. We have been committed to reducing our carbon footprint and promoting energy consumption, and we now want to further these efforts, and eliminate the use of single-use plastics in our hotels.”
On the single-use plastics products, the Group noted that it is a pressing environmental issue: over 13 million tonnes of plastic leak into the ocean every year, killing 100,000 marine animals annually, according to the United Nations Environment Programme. Bringing the issue closer to home, the BBC last week reported that Indonesia was cited by US plastics researchers as the world's second largest contributor of plastic waste to the oceans after China. This has resulted in Indonesian scientists launching the largest ever study into whether tiny plastic particles can affect human health.
Mr Richards said the upcoming initiatives are part of MHR’s sustainability efforts, where guests also play a role. For example, the group is planning to roll out green meeting packages, where water jugs are provided in place of plastic water bottles, and notepads are made from recycled paper. Additionally, guests can help in conserving water and energy, by opting not to have towels and linens changed everyday.
These initiatives further strengthen MHR’s commitment to going green and creating a “zero-waste” hotel operation model. In 2015, Grand Copthorne Waterfront was one of Singapore’s first hotels to partner the government’s food waste recycling programme by the National Environment Agency (NEA). By installing a food waste digester, Grand Copthorne Waterfront turns food waste into water that is used to water plants, wash the bin centre as well as common areas on the hotel grounds.
