The Gaia Hotel chain was born out of a desire to create environmentally friendly hotels and run them within a sustainable operating environment. The very first Gaia Hotel was completed in 2007 in American Canyon, California; a small town in Napa Valley where respect for Nature is second only to respect for oneself. The Gaia Napa Valley Hotel received the US Green Building Council’s very first LEED-Gold Certification for a hotel anywhere in the World.
The first Gaia Hotel broke new ground and earned the highest LEED certification ever for a hotel. During initial planning and construction, new approaches were developed for maximizing the environmental friendliness of the construction process and new methods were created for building a sustainable property. All of the lessons learned were applied to building the second Gaia Hotel located in Anderson, CA, just outside of Redding.
The Gaia Anderson Hotel was built using the most proven ‘Green’ technologies available including a Green Laundry System from Water Energy. Their new Green Laundry System will cut overall energy usage in the laundry by a whopping 75% and reduce net water use in the laundry by nearly 70%. This translates into billions of BTU’s and millions of gallons of water saved each year in the laundry alone. This savings in addition to all the other advances in reducing environmental impact will surely propel the Gaia Anderson Hotel to its own LEED Gold Certification.
The USGBC currently only gives up to a maximum of 5 points toward LEED certification for water savings initiatives including creative gray water reuse for irrigation. The US Green Building Council is currently developing a LEED program specifically for hotels and we hope they will take a much closer look at our Green Laundry Systems and increase the number of points available for water and energy conservation in all areas.
The Water Energy Green Laundry System located at the Gaia Anderson Hotel is designed to support up to 300 pounds of washer capacity on a continuous basis. It provides a high level of dissolved ozone to all washers for thorough cleaning and sanitation of the linen without any hot water. It is designed to capture and recycle all water coming from the washers except for water used during the detergent step of the wash programs. This elimination of hot water and the reuse of up to 70% of the water used will save the Gaia Anderson Hotel a tremendous amount of money year over year.
The Gaia Anderson Hotel processes about 3,000 pounds of linen each day in its laundry at full occupancy. In a traditional laundry setting, that activity would consume approximately 9,000 gallons of water each day, about 3,000,000 BTU’s for hot water (6,300 gallons heated 60-degrees) and near that many BTU’s in the dryers. The Water Energy Green Laundry System eliminates the need for all hot water, recycles up to 70% of water used, reduces drying times 30% and produces a superior finished product. With this savings rate, the Gaia Anderson Hotel could save over 1,500,000,000 (1.5 billion) BTU’s of energy (1,470 MCF Natural Gas) and over 2,000,000 (2 million) gallons of water every year! That translates to a reduction in Green House Gas production of 175,620 pounds of CO2! That’s a reduction of 88 tons of CO2 every year and more than enough water to fill an Olympic Pool 3 times! That is one GREEN laundry!
Photos / Downloads
Gaia Hotel, Anderson CA Laundry Layout Design (5.8 MiB)
