Ballynahinch Castle Going for Gold

Sustainability

In the past 6 months we here at Ballynahinch Castle signed up the Green Hospitality Programme (GHP) in order to achieve third party verification, from a recognised company, for our sustainability and environmental practices.

We achieved our Eco-Label Status on the 10th of March this year, 6 months after we signed up to the programme. Fortunately for us we already had a lot of good practices in place already, so we just had to clarify and provide evidence of all these things.

Sustainable Changes and existing practices:

Lightbulbs - One of the things we had in place already that needed verification was the use of only LED lightbulbs throughout the hotel. We do not have any Halogen or Incandescent bulbs in the Hotel. This is a something that had been slowly changing over the last number of years and means that bulbs are lasting longer and using less electricity to light the premises.

Staff Training – As part of our goal to improve our impact on the environment and make staff more aware of where waste goes, we introduced a waste separation training. All current staff received this training, and the training was also integrated into the new employee induction programme. This ensure that all staff are working from the same place. Following this training there was a noticeable decrease in our general waste and an increase in our recycling levels. Clearer labelling and some new bins where also introduced to further help with correct waste separation.

 Staff Electrical Waste Recycling – We recently implemented a programme where staff can bring in old electrical goods, ranging from old fridges and TVs to bulbs, and batteries and then the hotel will the take items and store them. Once there are enough items collected, both from the staff and the hotel itself we will contact WEEE Ireland, and they will come and collect it all from us. This has a number of benefits; we are now ensuring that all broken and damaged electrical waste is not ending up in our general waste, staff have the benefit of bringing items to work when they are coming and this in turn saves them time and fuel from having to take them to a recycling centre.

Green Noticeboard – To keep staff up to date on everything we are doing to help improve our environmental footprint we added a green noticeboard beside the clock-in machine. Part of getting a green programme to work in a business is to get all your staff involved and keeping them up to date on what is happening and what the hotel is doing as a business to improve environmentally, currently and in the future.

Staff litter pick-up – In the same vein of staff involvement we a planning to organise a staff litter collection day on some of the roads around the hotel and possibly some of the beaches we have locally.

Hotel Heating and Electricity – Before we’d ever joined up to GHP the hotel had a large wood pellet burner on site which is used to heat all the hot water that the hotel uses. This is one of our strongest assets in terms of renewable alternative energy sources and really sets the hotel on a “greener” path. Our electricity is supplied by Pinergy which as they state on their website is ‘100% renewable energy, guaranteed’.

Tree Planting – The hotel offers a tree planting activity on the grounds for guests to avail of this is something which is very popular with guests and, is very good in the longer term for the planet. Everyone should plant a tree somewhere in the country.

Compost Bays – On the grounds of the hotel estate we have a 2.5 acre walled garden. In December of last year we built large compost bays, which put all our garden waste into these bays, grass cuttings, leaves, hedge trimmings etc. and leave it to break down, turning the pile over regularly. We plan on using the broken down material as a mulch and fertiliser next winter and as a result we reduced our need to use fertilisers and our need for peat compost.

Walled Garden Veg Production – In our walled garden we have three veg plots where we grow everything from peas and potatoes to Pak Choi and sweetcorn, along with the usual cabbages, beetroots and onions, and everyone’s favourite, brussels sprouts. All the veg we grow is given to our kitchen and helps to supplement what they order in and gives the chefs the opportunities to do home grown specials. Growing the veg is great because it is on site so there is a very small field to fork distance. As the garden is open to the guests and the public it also allows people to see what is possible to grow in Ireland and guests often go away encouraged to try grow some of the things, they see here themselves. We are not a certified organic garden; however, we do employ organic practices in the garden, and only use organic fertilisers and pest control, e.g., using beer traps for slugs and seaweed as a fertiliser.