**2. Literature review**

#### **2.1 Concept of sustainability**

The sustainable development in tourism and hospitality covers three sustainability areas that are economic, environmental, and social versions [14]. Sustainability is as also defined as "the relationship between humans and global environment." Sustainability is linked to intergeneration equity [15, 16]. Other researchers Lee and Jan [17] considered that appropriate strategy across different developmental stages is also another important issue. So that hoteliers should find the best possible options to reduce costs and tourism negative impacts through environmental management [18].

#### **2.2 The concept of environmental sustainability**

Environmental sustainability in hotels connects to human life and health issue like food, water, air, energy, and waste management programs [19]. Social dimension sustainability is also another important part to increase social responsibility at corporate level that helps to increase the commitment of staff and customer to work together [20]. Every country has their own strategy to balance between input and output to achieve environmental sustainability. For example, some countries give priority to control pollution than considering consumption level from the beginning and others may prefer to reduce their population before reaching carrying capacity. Nowadays, hospitality industry contributes nearly 30% of emissions [21].

#### **2.3 Environmental attitude and behaviors**

Environmental attitudes have been defined as "the collection of beliefs, affect, and behavioral intentions a person holds regarding environmentally related activities or issues" [22, 23]. Environmental attitudes and concerns are interchangeable, and environmental concerns represent the tendency of human beings to influence their behavior in some way [24, 25].

In addition to macro-lodging facilities, environmental attitude of hotels connects to issues of corporate social responsibility, environmental, and green marketing policy [26]. Hotels aware about their negative impacts on environment but low actions to minimize impacts [27]. Hotels also expect financial and educational support from government to perform environmental sustainable practice [28]. There is a relationship between top management commitment and some external and internal factors. The top management commitment can influence environmental performance [29]. Travelers' comments also affect environmental management and sustainability of hotels [30, 31].

#### **2.4 Sustainable environmental practices in hotels**

Environmental-oriented practices are one of the quality scale services in hospitality [32]. Green practices performed in each area of service operation and categorized them into three main areas of environmentally friendly practices: energy management activities, waste management, and water conservation [33]. Food and beverage section, guest rooms, housekeeping section, laundry, conference, and meeting facilities are the basic service area hotel companies that implement green practices [34].

#### *2.4.1 Energy efficiency and management*

Hotel sectors consume massive amount of electricity as a main source of energy that covers about 75% of total energy consumption [35, 36]. Electricity consumption accounts for 73 and 75% of the operating costs of hotels in Hong Kong and New Zealand, respectively [37, 38]. Bohdanowicz [11] estimated that the carbon dioxide content in the floor of a hotel room was between 160 and 200 kg/m<sup>2</sup> , based on the fuel used by the hotel to generate electricity. Therefore, the hotel industry must make a positive contribution to the environment and reduce energy consumption [36, 39].

#### *2.4.2 Water consumption and efficiency*

Among natural resource used in hotels, water is very important and consumed more within one night [40, 41]. Hotels can practice different efficiency measures such as using water-saving or dry horticulture technology, using treated wastewater for garden irrigation, and water-saving equipment (low-flow or infrared activated faucet, low-flow shower nozzle, low-water-volume toilet, etc.), instituting a linen reuse program and using water-efficient laundry equipment and dishwashers [40, 42, 43].

#### *2.4.3 Waste management*

Scholars [44] found that weak waste management in hotels not only affects environment but also their market. Waste from food service section is the greatest amount of waste generated from hotels [12]. Food and beverage service areas in particular produce a variety of solid and organic wastes such as food waste, corks, and glass bottles. Housekeeping also produces clean materials and plastic packaging. The scholar [35] pointed out that hotel waste not only increases operating costs, but also leads to resource depletion. On the other hand, Pham Phu et al. [45] and Mensah and Ampofo [46] also stated that high-rated hotels have higher waste generation rate.

*Environmental Sustainability Practices in Hotels: From Attitudes to Implementation Case… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.109433*

### **2.5 Factors influencing adoption of environmental sustainability practices**

#### *2.5.1 Knowledge deficiency*

There are a number of factors that influence hospitality sector to implement environmentally friendly practices in their organization [47]. These factors are organizational and industry barriers. It can be categorized as internal and external factors [48]. Other scholars [49] also maintained that lack of environmental knowledge and information has been identified as a major constraint. Chan et al. [50] showed that environmental knowledge has a positive impact on environmental awareness and behavior. Zientara and Zamojska [51] found that most of the time low level of environmental knowledge leads to weak organizational emphasis on green practices.

#### *2.5.2 Customer attitudes*

Hotel amenities and green practices can influence customer revisit intentions [52]. Many guests are not willing and prepared to pay extra in order to support green initiatives [53, 54]. But Gagiolli [55] pointed that the conscientious customer is willing to spend the money to use sustainable products. Chuang et al. [7] found that hotel water-saving and waste management practices have significantly increased the environmental willingness of guests. Consumers can implement green practices when they stay at green hotels that lead to sustainability [56].

#### *2.5.3 Owner/manager attitude*

Hotels in developing countries take part in some of sustainable practices, but they have no green management policies [18, 57, 58]. Other scholar [59] also pointed out that Sri Lanka's hotel operators have taken some positive measures in their daily operations to achieve sustainable development, but they have not yet reached a satisfactory level. Musavengane [60] proposed the "Best Responsible Tourism Model," which comprises education, economic and marketing motivation, and building social networks, which can encourage small hotels managers to participate in responsible tourism.

#### *2.5.4 Finance*

Sustainable practices and polices help to minimize cost, and simple projects can be implemented by employee's commitment. Sustainable practices are often promoted as opportunity to minimize cost, but many mangers do not believe this [61]. Many hotels have difficulty in the pressure of implementing green practices that demand environmental auditing, impact assessment, and accreditation, which have high certification fees attached, especially during financial difficulty [59, 62].

#### *2.5.5 Legislation and accreditation*

Government policy and accreditation system have a significant effect in implementation of environmentally friendly practices because of their influence on decision making [63]. Specific tourism policies and general public policies have to be differentiated for the reason that many government organizations lack both regulatory

capacities [63]. The legislation has led to widespread environmental awareness, and that the organizations are willing to change their business processes and environmental strategies [64]. A presence of green agenda is a significant and important condition for green hotel choice [65, 66].
