Is your hotel paying an energy tax in disguise?

Hidden energy inefficiencies are a significant yet often overlooked cost in sectors such as industry, logistics, and hospitality. In this article, we draw on our recent collaboration with a luxury hotel in Germany to explore where hotels tend to consume the most energy, and how unnoticed waste can act as a silent drain on operational performance.

Beyond simply identifying inefficiencies, we detail how targeted interventions helped reduce consumption, simplify sustainability reporting, and enhance the overall guest experience. This is not just a case study, but a practical roadmap for how intelligent energy management can drive measurable value, one asset at a time.

Mapping energy use

Hotels are among the most energy-intensive facilities in the service sector. They operate 24/7, with complex requirements for comfort, services, and technology. But where is energy consumption concentrated?

Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems

They are among the most energy-intensive components in any hotel. Climate control systems operate continuously to ensure thermal comfort, but are often outdated or lack centralised control and real-time automation. Without integration into a smart energy management platform, HVAC units often continue operating at full capacity in unoccupied rooms or rarely accessed areas such as conference halls or seasonal wings. The result is a substantial amount of avoidable energy waste. Furthermore, improper scheduling, poor zoning, and the absence of feedback loops between occupancy and climate systems limit the ability to optimize comfort without sacrificing efficiency.

Domestic Hot Water (DHW) Production

Domestic hot water is a critical utility in the hospitality sector, especially in properties that include wellness centers, spas, fitness areas, industrial kitchens, and private en-suite bathrooms. These functions generate a constant and often high-intensity demand for hot water, both during peak hours and off-peak periods. Many hotels still rely on traditional boilers with low efficiency and high heat loss.These older units often suffer from high standby heat losses and limited load modulation, meaning energy is consumed even when demand is low. Without load tracking and smart thermal management, DHW production can quickly become one of the highest contributors to operational energy costs.

Lighting

Lighting represents another major area of inefficiency in many hotels. While LED technology and intelligent lighting controls are now widely available, their adoption is still lagging in many properties. In particular, common areas such as lobbies, corridors, stairwells, and meeting rooms often remain illuminated 24/7 regardless of occupancy or daylight levels. The absence of motion sensors, daylight harvesting systems, and dimming protocols means that substantial energy is consumed unnecessarily. Even guest rooms frequently lack integrated controls that power down lighting when rooms are unoccupied.

Kitchens and Laundries

Despite their central role in daily operations, hotel kitchens and laundry facilities are often excluded from energy efficiency strategies. These departments rely heavily on high-consumption equipment such as industrial ovens, stoves, dishwashers, washing machines, dryers, and extraction systems. Equipment is frequently left running during idle periods or operated inefficiently due to a lack of training or performance monitoring. Additionally, these areas typically require high ventilation loads and often contribute significantly to internal heat gains, which in turn increase HVAC demand. Without submetering and usage analysis, energy waste in these back-of-house departments can remain invisible but highly impactful.

Pools and Saunas

Maintaining water at a consistent temperature requires substantial and continuous thermal energy input, especially in colder climates or poorly insulated structures. Moreover, air handling units are necessary to maintain humidity control and indoor air quality in spa and pool zones, often operating in tandem with underfloor heating and dehumidification systems. If not monitored and optimized, these systems run at maximum load even during low-occupancy hours or when areas are not in use. The combination of thermal load, ventilation requirements, and long operating hours makes these amenities a top priority for targeted efficiency upgrades.

Benchmark your savings: insights from facilities like yours

When a sustainable luxury resort in Germany set out to improve its energy performance, it encountered a set of challenges common across the hospitality industry. The resort was facing a variety of common issues: high consumption driven by HVAC systems, wellness amenities, and guest services. At the same time, the resort lacked the visibility needed to identify inefficiencies across its sprawling infrastructure. Balancing operational cost control with uncompromising service standards proved increasingly complex, especially under the growing expectations of eco-conscious guests and the stringent requirements of sustainability certifications such as Green Key and the EU Ecolabel.

To address these challenges, the resort partnered with Veil Energy to implement E-BOOST, our advanced energy monitoring and management platform. The initial phase of the project focused on achieving deep visibility into energy consumption, with particular attention to high-impact areas such as HVAC systems, spa facilities, kitchens, and guest accommodations.

By enabling real-time anomaly detection, the platform helped identify unusual consumption patterns and inefficiencies, often correlated with occupancy rates and usage fluctuations. In parallel, E-BOOST streamlined the collection and organization of sustainability-related data, simplifying reporting for ESG frameworks and accelerating progress toward certifications such as Green Key and the EU Ecolabel.

The impact was immediate: the resort achieved a 7% reduction in energy costs, faster certification processes, and improved guest perception thanks to its transparent, data-driven approach to sustainability. And yet, this was just the beginning—the foundation for a broader energy efficiency strategy.

What’s next?

Following the initial major step toward improving energy efficiency, our focus has now shifted to incremental yet impactful enhancements. In this update, we present our latest analysis of the hotel’s most energy-intensive assets—insights that point to further potential opportunities for substantial cost savings.

Veil Energy’s support

At Veil Energy, we empower hotels to control energy performance through E-BOOST, combining hardware, intelligent software, and expert consulting. Real-time monitoring optimizes energy use, improves efficiency, and ensures compliance.

This would represent another 5% costs and energy reduction on the overall consumption.

Beyond energy savings

While the potential savings outlined above represent a strong financial incentive, the impact of these optimizations extends beyond economics. For the hospitality sector, improving energy performance is not just about reducing costs—it’s about aligning operations with growing environmental expectations and delivering on sustainability commitments. Reducing energy costs is only one of the many benefits that come with investing in energy efficiency, long term advantages include:

• Increased property value: buildings with efficient energy systems typically achieve better energy performance certificates (EPCs) and sustainability ratings—factors that are increasingly influencing property valuations in both the hospitality and commercial real estate markets. Properties with strong energy credentials are more attractive to investors, buyers, and operators, particularly as ESG criteria become central to financial decision-making. In many cases, enhanced energy performance can increase a property’s market value by 5–15%, while also improving its long-term asset resilience and appeal in green-certified portfolios.
• Access to public incentives and tax breaks: In Italy, for example, mechanisms like the Superbonus 110%—extended into 2024 for specific sectors—and Conto Termico 2.0 offer substantial financial support. These schemes can cover up to 65% of the investment cost for advanced energy management systems like E-BOOST, including hardware, software, and installation. At the European level, the Next Generation EU recovery plan has allocated over €80 billion specifically for the energy transition and green economy. Within this framework, sustainable tourism is recognized as a priority sector, offering additional funding opportunities for hotels that implement low-carbon technologies, improve building performance, or digitize their energy infrastructure. Tapping into these incentives represents a key driver for many hospitality businesses investing in energy efficiency. Not only reduces upfront investment but it also strengthens a property’s competitiveness and compliance with future policy requirements.
• Enhanced reputation among eco-conscious guests: 79% of global travelers consider energy efficiency a priority when choosing accommodations. Properties that adopt and communicate clear environmental policies report a 20–30% increase in positive reviews on platforms like TripAdvisor and Booking.com, often citing comfort, responsibility, and innovation as reasons for guest satisfaction. In a highly competitive market, energy efficiency becomes a strategic lever for reputation, guest retention, and long-term positioning.

At Veil Energy, we empower hotels to take control of their energy performance through E-BOOST, our integrated platform that combines cutting-edge hardware, intelligent software, and tailored expert consulting.

With real-time monitoring of energy production and consumption, E-BOOST leverages proprietary algorithms to optimize energy use, improve operational efficiency and ensure full regulatory compliance.

Curious about how Veil Energy can support your journey toward efficiency and sustainability? Contact us!