How do you balance saving money and energy with guest satisfaction?
WF: We have goals to reduce consumption and we have to look at them from year to year — this is in line with the Municipality [DTCM] and the new energy regulations.

So the plan to reduce energy consumption is in place and this is something we have to implement in our properties, but it doesn’t mean compromising on guest satisfaction.

SP: We are able to lower our consumption by having energy benchmarks — we have an online system monitored by a third party which compares our property to others in a similar bracket, to see how much energy we are using. At the end of the year we get a report of our carbon emissions and use the information to set future goals. Again, this is something we keep an eye on within the property.

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GD: I don’t want to play with something like the A/C system when the guest is there — I am looking to save electricity on unoccupied rooms, because I focus on guest satisfaction and I try to avoid involving the guest in my savings.

We monitor the room temperature and can make savings by using less energy at certain times of day — you increase the temperature slightly when the guest is asleep and then decrease it before they wake up, that way you save four hours of energy and the guest has a perfect night’s sleep.

NF: But you have to be careful because if your guest has a bad stay, all it takes is for them to get on TripAdvisor and say that they have had a bad experience at your hotel, for example if the temperature is too hot it makes a big difference, so you could be biting the hand that feeds you. I could save AED 20 (US $5.4) on room costs, but imagine the damage it could cause.

How much say do engineers have in the property at the building stage?
WF: Engineers are being brought in at such a late stage, once things have already been done, and it is very difficult to change the things which haven’t been done properly.

But there is one thing that can change, and that is having a design standard for everything. From this, engineers can have an input. Essentially, you can’t take care of a new build if engineering has not been taken into account.

Things like solar panelling and lighting — if you do these things at the beginning of the build it is easy, but if you try to add them in afterwards, that is when you will have problems.

GD: Refurbishment is something we can put our stamp on. Designers and architects are very good at making the vision of the owner come to fruition; but what we need to be able to do is sit down with them and say ‘that’s great, how do I maintain it?’, because the architects are not designing things to maintain equipment.

They aren’t thinking about how to maintain the property, so when you are involved in a refurbishment, it is your chance to have an input. A lot of the time, companies will bring you in during the last three months of a new build, but that is already too late because the A/C is in the wrong place, or things have been made more difficult for you.

Abraham John: Construction and maintenance are two very different things, and maintenance is often not considered when hotels are being designed — so renovation is a good opportunity to improve things and make the building a great deal easier to maintain.

How much impact do you have on the direction of the hotel?
GD: Our input is getting better and better because room rates have settled at the moment, so the next step is where we can save and where we can make more money — and the only people who have a big influence on this are the engineers.

Honestly you have the room price as standard, but how do you save on costs? Engineering has much more power to affect the bottom line than any other department.

How you save is by investing in the correct equipment and so on; we have the power to do this and we are better positioned than we were 10 years ago when we were just seen as the guys who fixed things.

NF: When you are running a hotel you are able to give your expertise and recommendations for what you would like to see being done. We also have a 10-year plan for what we would like to see happen in the hotel. So it is important that we have the freedom to do this, and have our input in hotel decisions. For engineers, it is important for you to be heard.

SA: When you look at the total cost of a hotel, you have the payroll costs first, then energy costs are your second highest. So that is why we have everything in our hands — we can take advantage of this now and that is why we are saving energy.

It is much easier for us as engineers to purchase things now, to change things within the hotel and to be green, because everybody is convinced that it will save the hotel money. We are the department that has the power to do this.