Edinburgh Hotel keeps its record on sustainability

Green ambitions sit top of the agenda at Ten Hill Place hotel

Edinburgh’s largest independent hotel can now stake a claim as being one of the country’s greenest – after its team retained a highly-prized sustainability accreditation for a record fourteenth year.

Ten Hill Place in the heart of the historic Old Town has been recognised with a Green Tourism Gold Award after receiving excellent scores across a range of exacting metrics covering most elements of its operations.

The hotel first achieved the accolade in 2008 and has successfully retained the award following regular assessments in the intervening years.

Assessors praised the hotel’s commitment to supporting local communities and charities while locally sourcing sustainable and ethically produced food.

In recent years the charitable hotel has partnered with Scottish Water to reduce single use water bottles, become almost entirely powered by Scottish renewables and has also installed EV charging in all parking bays. In addition, it provides all guests with bee-friendly wildflowers to promote biodiversity.

The 129-bedroom hotel is operated by Surgeons Quarter– the commercial arm of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh (RCSEd) – with profits put back into advancing surgical standards and improving patient outcomes worldwide.

Euan Haggart, Environment & Sustainability Assessor for Green Tourism said: “Ten Hill Place has done an excellent job in achieving the Green Tourism Gold award and it reflects the increasingly high standards expected for a sustainable business.

“The team displayed an impressive understanding of sustainability, awareness of opportunities and the challenges associated with running a responsible business.”

Other factors contributing to the accreditation success included best practice on energy monitoring and conservation measures and the excellent promotion of the destination area and how to enjoy it responsibly.

Feedback highlighted two key areas of improvement, carbon and biodiversity, which Ten Hill Place is now actively working to improve. Green Business Tourism has acknowledged that these aspects are particularly challenging for urban businesses.

Mark McKenzie, Surgeons Quarter General Manager, said: “Ten Hill Place Hotel is a good choice for conscious consumers –we’re mindful of the effects that travel and the tourism industry has on our planet so we look to implement sustainable methods across all operations.

“Achieving this award is an important hallmark of ‘green quality’ and plays a significant role in helping to attract business from the increasing number of eco-minded clients who search for and base their hotel choice on whether a venue has good green credentials or not.

“We’re always looking to make our practices more sustainable and the team has worked extremely hard to make a lot of positive changes over the years which we are extremely proud of – with this award being the pinnacle.”

Out of 330 Green Tourism Members in Scotland, 54 are based in Edinburgh with businesses ranging from caravan & camping sites to golf clubs, hotels, conference venues and tour operators.

Scott Mitchell, Managing Director of Surgeons Quarter, said: “We’re all increasingly more mindful of the impact we have on the environment and the need to act responsibly – with guests encouraged to think green when they are staying with us to help us maintain our standards.

“There is still a way to go, but it’s important to celebrate and recognise the dedicated and hard work of our staff that has got us to this point on our sustainability journey and we are delighted to once again have retained our Gold Green Tourism Award.”

This announcement follows the venue reaching an important milestone that it is almost entirely powered by Scottish renewable sources, saving an estimated 790 tonnes of carbon per year and equating to 3,430 return trips to Rome.

For more information on Ten Hill Place, visit: https://www.tenhillplace.com/