A Step Closer to Sustainable Corporate Housing: Preparing for the CHPA Carbon Calculator

Momentum is building across the business travel and global workforce industries to provide travelers and relocating employees and their employers with more options for sustainably friendly accommodations and more precise data on the carbon footprint of a stay in furnished living.

Among the most important and visible sustainability initiatives in the temporary accommodations industry is the project now underway to develop a Carbon Calculator that is intended to be accessible to all providers of furnished accommodations services. With the launch of the calculator in early 2025, corporate clients, relocation management companies, travel management companies, global solutions managers and agencies, and the guests themselves will have access to validated data on the carbon usage associated with a stay in corporate housing.

Dwellworks Living has been an advocate for the development of a universal, unbiased, agnostic, and scientifically validated carbon emissions measurement tool since we first committed to our co-leadership role with the Sustainability Workgroup of the Corporate Housing Providers Association (CHPA). Dwellworks Living and our workgroup co-leadership colleagues at CAP Worldwide were the first corporate housing partners to pledge support as Platinum Sponsors of the Carbon Calculator Project that is now underway under the direction of CHPA with the expertise of Greenview, a recognized subject matter expert in carbon emissions calculation and reporting for the hospitality industry. Much of the preparation information for the Carbon Calculator has been formulated in Sustainability Workgroup working sessions, reflecting broad and geographically diverse representation from the temporary living industry among various partners and operators.

Look for the first iteration of the Corporate Housing Carbon Calculator to be introduced to furnished accommodations providers at CHPA Connect25 in San Diego in February of next year.  Training, implementation and uptake will follow. 

What Does the Carbon Calculator Measure and Why?

The data to be captured will be for the occupied rooms themselves, as many corporate living accommodations are individual units (versus entire buildings) and also do not typically bear the ‘carbon cost’ of facilities like hotels which need to account not only for guest accommodations but also for public spaces, food service, pools and saunas, and other high carbon use amenities. 

Carbon calculation information establishes an important milestone for operators who have asked for a single tool for reporting (and thus controlling) their overall administrative costs. With the data from the Carbon Calculator, property operators can build their plans for continuous improvement in their sustainable practices and measure those outcomes. Dwellworks Living will flag our portfolio properties that participate in the Carbon Calculator project so that clients are presented with choices that meet not only pricing, location, and amenities specifications, but also indicators of both the carbon footprint associated with a stay at the property as well as validation that the property partner is committed to ongoing sustainable action.

How Green Can You Go? Boosting Your Company’s Sustainability Strategy

Sustainability remains a key focus in business travel management due to the significant environmental impact of travel, especially in air and ground transportation but also in accommodations as well.  With regulatory reporting requirements such as the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) now in place, companies are required to disclose the actions they are taking to specifically contribute to lowered greenhouse gas emissions as well as meet multiple other metrics and targets in sustainability and social responsibility.

Business travel managers looking to get a sense of the maturity of their company’s sustainability performance are invited by GBTA to participate in their Sustainability Acceleration Challenge – a commitment to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050 or sooner.  The first step is completing a Maturity Assessment of your company’s sustainability policies and practices.  You can learn more at GBTAFoundation.org.

GBTA has also shared a set of Sustainable Procurement Standards, in the form of standardized sustainability questions, that travel buyers and their procurement partners can use when sourcing suppliers and evaluating their sustainability efforts. In addition to standardizing criteria for suppliers and streamlining the evaluation process, the Sustainable Procurement Standards from GBTA are a template being looked at by other travel and workforce mobility associations in the Coalition for Greener Mobility, including CHPA and the Sustainability Advisory Council at WERC. 

The coalition partners plan to support global mobility decision-makers and procurement managers by formulating similarly standardized questions for their distributed supply chains. Suppliers want to be supportive of their clients’ sustainability expectations but need a reasonable framework to build their responses and make appropriate investments over time. Standardized guidelines remove one of the barriers to sustainable action, which is wasted or inefficient effort. For more information on GBTA’s sustainability goals and current initiatives, read our blog summarizing their 2024 Conference in Atlanta.

What’s Next in Sustainability in Furnished Accommodations?

We expect significant progress in sustainability will be made in the next 12 months, as corporate guidelines for performance become more standardized and understood by their suppliers, and as reporting becomes common practice and the data can be used not only to contribute to the presentation and selection of furnished accommodations options, but also as a framework for sustained improvement in daily operating practices. 

97% of Dwellworks Living’s highest volume housing partners have attested they have already adopted some degree of sustainability actions in their properties, whether that is lowered water usage, more efficient lighting, heating, and cooling systems, or more sustainably supported amenities and furnishings in their units. The next stage is combining good actions with measurable reporting. Further gains in sustainability, in the best interest of people, planet, and prosperity, will continue to be dependent on the shared commitment of all stakeholders in making progress, from client travel policy to traveler choices, property operating efficiency, and solution partner feedback and education. To learn more about how we measure our sustainability efforts, read our 2023 ESG Impact Report.

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Dwellworks Living: Global Solutions for Corporate Accommodations  

Dwellworks Living is committed to providing our clients and their employees with the best possible corporate housing and serviced accommodations experience. With a global network of property partners, a tri-regional team of customer experience and supply chain professionals, and a wide range of services for global mobility and travel customers, Dwellworks Living can provide the perfect corporate housing solution for any need or budget. 

Dwellworks Living is the global corporate housing solution of Dwellworks, an award-winning, business-to-business provider of global mobility and business travel services. As a global leader in corporate housing and serviced accommodations solutions, Dwellworks Living is uniquely positioned to meet the temporary living needs of businesses and their employees who are relocating or traveling on short, medium, or extended-stays. With 80,000 high-quality professionally managed properties in over 125 countries worldwide, Dwellworks Living is the preferred housing solutions partner of many Fortune 1000 and leading relocation management companies. 

Dwellworks Living's corporate housing and serviced accommodations solutions are designed to help businesses attract and retain top talent, support employee productivity, and ensure a smooth and successful relocation or business travel experience. In addition to our core global accommodations management services, Dwellworks Living, through our worldwide network of local experts, is uniquely capable of offering our clients expanded and related services, such as area orientations, group move assistance, destination services and intercultural training. 

Whether you have corporate housing needs for an individual employee or a large team, Dwellworks Living can provide the serviced accommodations solutions you need anywhere in the world to ensure a safe and successful stay. Please contact us to learn more or visit our Properties page to begin your search for global corporate housing accommodations.