At the recent Irish Hotels Federation Climate Action Conference, data from Fáilte Ireland revealed a truly remarkable achievement:
- Currently the average Scope 1 and 2 carbon emissions for hotels in Ireland and the UK stands at 21 kilograms of CO2 equivalent per guest night (EarthCheck 2025).
- However, for hotels participating in the Failte Ireland Climate Action Programme, this average plummets to a mere 6 kilograms of CO2 equivalent per guest night for 2024. (Failte Ireland 2025)
- The results represent an astounding 71% improvement over existing benchmarks!
We should be celebrating and widely publicising this exceptional result, showcasing the actions taken by these approximately 100 hotels. This would provide an invaluable learning opportunity for other hotels and business sectors to improve their own environmental performance.
What is needed now is a detailed report from Failte Ireland identifying the actions taken by these hotels to reduce their carbon footprint, so that all other hotels can learn from these and implement them.
This report must include detailed Case Study information, including full financial data, to support additional take-up of these actions by the other c. 760 hotels in Ireland and there should be no delay in producing this report as 2030 is fast approaching. When can we expect this report? (Note: Existing published “Case Studies” lack financial data so it is not possible for operators to calculate returns on investment etc.)
Such a significant reduction also suggests a powerful opportunity to actively market Irish Hotels as offering one of the lowest carbon footprints per guest night globally.
Minister Peter Burke should take steps to ensure these great practices are widely shared, and the marketing departments of both Tourism Ireland and Fáilte Ireland should begin promoting this to national and international visitors. This could be a powerful message to counter the perception of Ireland as a high-cost destination: “we may be above average in cost, but we can deliver an internationally low carbon footprint.”
We eagerly anticipate seeing these positive marketing messages and best practices published sooner rather than later, benefiting all stakeholders. This is particularly crucial at a time when visitor numbers are declining.
Perhaps Minister Peter Burke could champion this narrative further, especially following COP30, to position Ireland as a carbon reduction leader rather than a laggard. Even Taoiseach Micheál Martin could get involved! This is an especially impressive feat, considering that most other sectors in Ireland are projected to miss their 2030 climate reduction targets.
Caveats
The information provided above was sourced from a presentation given by Failte Ireland at the IHF/Failte Ireland Climate Action Conference held in Dublin in October 2025 which I attended. The data presented included summary, average and median data and the hotel sample is assumed to be from the same hotels during 2018/19 to 2023/24. No background data was made available from Failte Ireland, requested and denied, so GHP can only comment on the data presented.
We are also not privy to the methodology used to produce the results and whether the data allows for zero-carbon electricity usage, or other carbon avoidance activities, including carbon offsetting in Ireland or overseas
Data from other sources, including the Green Hospitality Programme, have not shown such positive results, making these new figures even more impactful.
Any queries, industry or academic, with respect to the data should be directed to the Climate Action Programme, Failte Ireland.
All observations here are GHP’s observations