The Union Hotel

THE UNION HOTEL

The Union Hotel strives to be environmentally friendly and do their part in order to reduce harm on the Australian environment. Through this several policies, devices and external services have been acquired.

SAVING OUR WATER

The Union Hotel is mindful of the fact that water is precious. With the recent water restrictions and still some Water Wise Rules The Union Hotel has worked with J.G. Wilson Plumbing in order to install flow controls with in the restroom taps. These flow controls are set with a timer for approximately ten seconds for each use. With this a reduction of water usage from each patron will apply. The urinals are also programmed with a sensor system as well as a “lock-out” function in which toilets slow down the flushing during multiple uses. With these in place a reduction of vandalism also occurs which leads to a savings of water for approximately 3 out of 6 flushes.

An IHS Bio Urinal solution is also used at The Union Hotel, which doses regular intervals of three strains of naturally occurring bacteria into each urinal vessel. This product has been formulated so that the correct level of bacteria will be released with each dose. This is done in order to prevent urinal vessels which can accumulate within the pipework and cause slower flows and even block toilets leading to overflows. This can also cause the odours within restrooms. This Green solution significantly reduces the use of water, eliminates uric scale build up, reduces malodour as well as diminishes the use of harsh chemicals.

“…leads to a savings of water…as well as diminishes the use of harsh chemicals.”

CLEANING

As biodegradable cleaning products are more costly many do not use the sufficient products in order to aid sustainability for our future. However, The Union Hotel is working hard to limit the chemicals used for cleaning. The detergents, obtained from Eco Wash Products, which are used to clean the dishes, floor and working tables within the kitchen are all readily biodegradable detergents. Even though the detergents for the machines in the kitchens are not readily biodegradable all staff follow The Union Hotel and their policy by diluting the detergents before use in order to make them biodegradable ready.

Further, The Union Hotel uses the services of Butler Carpet Cleaning. The Union Hotel was attracted to them as they use minimal impact cleaning products, which are degraded by natural bacteria and have been certified by Environmental Choice Australia. Their detergents also more than comply with Australia’s Standards and the O.E.C.D. standard with all being able to degrade over 90% in 21 days. Butler Carpet Cleaning uses natural non-petroleum based ingredients as they are broken down a lot easier in the Australian environment as well as easing the pressure on sewerage and septic systems. Overall, this system lessons the usage of water, creates no waste water, very low noise pollution, no air pollution and no fossil fuels.

"The Union Hotel is working hard to limit the chemicals used for cleaning."

RECYCLING

Pubs and Hotels acquire a great deal of waste, however The Union Hotel tries to limit this waste as much as possible through recycling. Currently only 10% of glass bottles from the hospitality industry are being recycled, with The Union Hotel being a part of this percentage. A bottle crusher from Bottlecycler has been built into The Union Hotel in which staff place empty bottles into the machine in order to crush them. These crushed pieces of glass, also called a cullet, are collected by Bottlecycler and taken to the Sydney Visy processing plant for automatic sorting. Due to dedicated trucks, which only collect clean glass cullet, and the sorting of coloured cullet a minimum of 80% of beneficial glass can be used in order to make new bottles. The benefits of this system for the environment are significant as early stage crushing eliminates noise pollution, improves the quality of the recyclable glass to be used again as well as reducing CO2 discharge into the atmosphere.

The Union Hotel also does its part to reduce the waste of useful products such as cardboard. All cardboard that works its way through the Hotel is recycled through Cozens Paper Recycling in order to reduce energy usage, pollution, greenhouse gasses as well as the unneeded waste.

"Currently only 10% of glass bottles from the hospitality industry are being recycled…"

REDUCING ENERGY USAGE

The Union Hotel is aware of the effect energy use has on Climate Change. In some cases it is hard to stop or even lesson the usage of energy whilst running a Hotel. At the end of a busy night some staff may even forget to turn energy using devices off. However, The Union Hotel has foreseen this and has implemented Time Clocks in order to automatically turn off and on any external lights as well as air-conditioning at the beginning or end of trading hours. This is implemented in order to confirm that the least amount of energy is used at The Union Hotel and what is used is only during the necessary trading times.

The Union Hotel also takes further advantage of Butler Carpet Cleaning services in order to maintain and clean the air-conditioning and refrigeration areas around the Hotel. This is coupled with a Power Factor Correction Unit which puts electricity back into the grid with a power factor of approximately ten. This allows the devices to work more effectively and in turn use less power and energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to help our environment.

“The Union Hotel has foreseen this… use less power and energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions…”

THE UNION HOTEL

The Union Hotel is determined to be as eco friendly as possible and is continuously striving to improve their policies, devices and choose their external suppliers and services wisely.