Engineering resilience, circularity and healthfulness in the tourism industry

The need to provide thermally comfortable interior spaces to customers of the hospitality sector remains a key factor to achieve satisfaction, and with the COVID-19 pandemic, the need to provide well ventilated spaces has also become a necessity. Relying on active systems to meet these requirements may be seen as an easy choice but can add significant costs to the energy bill, while also increasing the carbon footprint. On the other hand, adopting the more sustainable passive design measures can unlock potential to achieve healthy and comfortable spaces at reduced energy consumption, which means the hospitality sector can face the challenge of reduced room occupancy rates by looking for synergies between their customer needs and environmental protection. A similar approach can be taken for the water and waste aspects, well captured by circular economy principles and sustainability frameworks for the built environment as illustrated in this chapter.