Grand Hyatt Atlanta High-Efficiency Products

Background

Located in Atlanta's upscale Buckhead neighborhood and convenient to Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, Grand Hyatt Atlanta is one of the premiere hotels in the city. With 438 of the largest guestrooms in Buckhead, this hotel hosts thousands of business and leisure travelers each week.

Challenges

Hotels are dependent on water to operate their business. Toilets, showers and laundry use most of the hotel's water and are a necessity. With the drought conditions Atlanta experienced in the last several years, the hospitality industry has been under scrutiny to ease their impact on the water supply. Atlanta area water and sewer rates quadrupled in the last 10 years, so Director of Engineering Roy Griffin began looking for ways to reduce the hotel's water use.

"Controlling consumption is not only environmentally sound, it is smart business," the 20-year veteran with Hyatt Hotel Corporation said. "You have to stay in touch with the trends in your area. You have to know when costs are going to rise; otherwise, you are leaving money on the table."

Water-Saving Solution

Guest rooms account for much of the water used in hotels and toilets specifically are the largest indoor water consumer. Grand Hyatt operated with 3.5 gallon per flush (gpf) toilets in their guest rooms. At the Hyatt's annual Engineers Conference, Griffin was introduced to TOTO's Eco UltraMax High-Efficiency Toilet (HET). "I was impressed," he said. "Its water savings, performance, and design appeal were just what I was looking for."

The TOTO HET toilet flushes 1.28 gpf, providing 20 percent water savings over the 1.6 gpf toilets now mandated by the Energy Policy Act of 1992 and a 63 percent savings over the previous 3.5 gpf toilets. Simply replacing an older, high- volume toilet with a TOTO HET, the hotel could save thousands of gallons of water per day.

The Challenges

Atlanta area water and sewer rates quadrupled in the last 10 years, and in July 2008, Atlanta faced a 27.5% increase on their water and sewer rates.

The Solution

TOTO's 1.28 gpf Eco UltraMax High-Efficiency Toilet

The Results

• 63 percent water savings over the previous 3.5 gpf toilets
• 460 HETs that contribute to saving 29 gallons per guest night
• Overall water conservation efforts lead to 3,253,000 gallons of water saved per year

"Controlling consumption is not only environmentally sound, it is smart business. You have to stay in touch with the trends in your area. You have to know when costs are going to rise; oth-erwise, you are leaving money on the table."
Roy Griffin, Director of Engineering, Grand Hyatt Atlanta

The Retrofit

In July 2008, Atlanta faced a 27.5% increase on their water and sewer rates, so Griffin planned the retrofit of the hotel's 460 toilets with Eco UltraMax toilets immediately. "Everyone at TOTO and their distributor were very easy to work with, "said Griffin, "We were extremely happy with how well the change-out went for such a huge project. In fact, installation went so well that we never had a lost room night during the process."

Griffin soon realized the water conservation was just one of the benefits of TOTO HET toilets. "These units are equipped with a 3" flush valve that provides a powerful flush. Its consistent high performance has all but eliminated guest complaints about clogged toilets, which has freed our maintenance engineers to focus on other duties," he said.

The Results

In addition to retrofitting the guest rooms with high-efficiency toilets, Griffin installed more efficient showerheads, lavatory flow restrictors that reduce the flow to 1.0 gallons per minute (gpm), and a water- reclamation system that filters and reuses 75% of water in the laundry process. All of the water conservation programs put into place contributes to a total water savings of 3,253,000 gallons of water, a reduction of 29 gallons per guest night. The hotel continues to work diligently to minimize its impact on the environment by conserving resources and reducing waste and by fostering a culture of environmental consciousness among its associates, guests and business partners.