Concerned about your carbon footprint? Worried about how your travel is contributing to global warming? Now there is a Website that allows you to have a “green” journey.

 

Rezhub.com allows users to choose a hotel not only with familiar tools such as price, hotel name, or distance from a landmark, but also a “Sort by Green” score feature. The Green Score rates hotels based on how they care for the environment.

 

According to the company, the “Sort by Green” score feature works just as a "sort by price" would work. When sorted, hotels appear in order of their Green Score starting with the highest at the top and the lowest at the bottom.

 

RezHub.com and their Green Travel Hub launched in September of 2007 to help travelers learn that going “green” does not have to mean going to extremes. RezHub has used Green Score for nearly 3000 hotels so far, of which 1000 hotels are in the U.S. and the rest worldwide.

 

Marketing Director for the Website, Melissa Evans, pointed out that customers need to encourage hotels that may have received only one Green Score Branch.

Evans said, "It's important to support the green efforts that each hotel is making because it shows the management that they are doing the right thing. Supporting these programs now will help them grow in the future."

The RezHub Green Score ratings system for hotels shows customers a list of “Green Amenities”, or steps that a hotel can take to help protect the planet. Each Green Amenity has a points value of 1, 2, or 3 (an amenity with 3 points being the most difficult to achieve). Adding up the points for each amenity gives the Green Score for that hotel.

Each hotel is awarded one Green Branch for each score level they achieve. Hotels need to show that they are participating in or incorporating at least one of the Green Amenities to get started in the program.

Some examples of green amenities are: incorporating recycling programs, using Energy Star Appliances, donating to non-profits, landscaping with native plant gardens, serving organic food, using compact fluorescent lighting.

The Website gives clients the option to rent a “green” car – that is the option to book hybrid, flex fuel or low emissions vehicles. Rezhub claims to donate a portion of each flight booked on its Website to a green organization so that customers can go “carbon neutral.”

RezHub.com added that it is donating 20 percent of their revenue from all travel booked at the Green Travel Hub to an environmental organization, irrespective of the customer choosing to book a green specific trip. Customers vote on which non-profit group actually "gets the green".