A Green Key Venue in North Zealand
With a location in the middle of Bernstorff Castle Garden's stunning green expanses, we have a natural desire to preserve and protect our local environment and do what we can here at Bernstorff Castle to ensure that current and future generations have the best opportunities henceforward.
The continuous work to reduce Bernstorff Castle's footprint on the planet includes the entire company and preferably in close collaboration with our guests. Energy optimization, food waste reduction and several other projects have already been implemented and have taken us a long way, but the journey continues and there is always room for improvement.
Read more about our thoughts and policies below
Sustainability policy
At Bernstorff Slot, we work with the vision of promoting sustainability in the service industry. As part of this vision, we strive to integrate responsible consumption and production into our hotel and restaurant operations. This applies not only in our own solutions to climate challenges, but also in our choice of suppliers, partners, etc.
Therefore, we strive to find suppliers and partners who live up to our sustainability policy.
In our continuous efforts to achieve a greener profile, we use the UN Sustainable Development Goals as a guiding principle, with a particular focus on Goal 12, Responsible Consumption and Production. Being part of the hospitality industry, this is where our primary environmental responsibility lies and where we have the opportunity to make a tangible difference. In our efforts to improve Responsible Consumption and Production, we focus on 4 strategic focus areas.
- Reducing food waste
- Increased focus on eco-label procurement
- Improved waste sorting and recycling
- Reducing water and energy consumption
As an example of one of our initiatives, in 2020 we reduced food waste by 50% by switching from buffet to portioned meals. We recently reduced our electricity consumption by 20% by using only energy-saving bulbs for lighting. We have continuously optimized our fixtures on all taps in the castle's restaurant and hotel area. Overall, this has reduced our water consumption by more than 30% from 2020 to 2022.
In addition to reducing our overall carbon footprint, we continuously explore new knowledge and technology to ensure increased environmental protection. For example, we have installed Smart thermostats on all our radiators to continuously reduce energy consumption.
In addition to our sustainability policy, we work with a number of organic certifications and ecolabels. Read more about Green Key below. To qualify for Green Key, you must meet a number of strict environmental requirements across 13 areas, including energy and water consumption.
Bernstorff Castle has had the Green Key since the fall of 2022, but we are not stopping here and aim for more certifications and continuous improvement in everything we do.
Hope you'll join us on the journey.
CSR policy
At Bernstorff Castle, we continuously work to improve our Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) as a company. It is an extension of our environmental policy and includes a broader dimension with a special focus on social sustainability and social responsibility. It expands sustainability considerations to include parameters such as
- Improving human rights and equality.
- Contributing to the local area
- Support and partnerships
- Donation
Our overall CSR strategy includes all these areas and seeks to integrate our social responsibility into day-to-day business operations. We therefore strive for fair and equal treatment of employees, responsible inclusion of local community interests in our business, as well as our company's overall contribution to the local community and to society as a whole.
On a global level, we have a responsibility for the planet we all live on, but also for the way we treat people. As part of our CSR strategy, we therefore strive to improve employee inclusion and care in the way we run our business. As part of a piece of protected cultural heritage, we also have an imperative responsibility to lease Bernstorff Castle in a considerate way in relation to our shared history, the dissemination of knowledge, and involving citizens in our shared cultural heritage.
As part of this goal, we engage in a wide range of support and partnerships with businesses and organizations in the local area, and collaborate across the board to optimize our lease of a historic treasure, Bernstorff Castle.
Purchasing policy
At Bernstorff Castle, we are working hard to optimize a green procurement policy. The goal is to minimize the impact on the environment as much as possible and contribute to supporting the environmentally conscious part of the market. We will therefore include environmental considerations on an equal footing with other considerations in the planning and execution of the company's purchases.
When purchasing, we focus on buying products and services that have the least environmental impact during their lifecycle. In addition to sustainability, this includes consideration of price, quality, service, delivery reliability, operating costs, working environment and ethical issues.
As a guideline for our procurement, we closely follow Green Key's criteria. We communicate requirements and wishes to relevant suppliers to ensure a coordinated green effort. The following points summarize our main focus areas:
- Buying goods and services that minimize resource waste and pollution during production, use and disposal; for example, goods that comply with an eco-label.
- That we are generally positive towards partners who make an active effort for the environment and constantly seek to reduce the environmental impact of the product or service. This can be anything from minimizing water, energy and chemical consumption to using less and more environmentally friendly packaging and wrapping, choice of transport mode and much more.
- We compare the operating costs with the purchase, installation and maintenance costs, as there is often an overall price and environmental saving even if the purchase price is higher. For improvements and renovations, we also look at the payback period.
- That we consider the quality of the product to increase durability and thus minimize the need for replacement and subsequent disposal of e.g. furniture.
- That we continuously assess how the environmental benefits can be proportionate to the effort and costs, in short: Where and how we get the most environmental value for money.
The Green Key
Green Key is an independent international labeling scheme. The environmental organization FEE, which is also behind other labeling schemes such as Blue Flag, is responsible for the international work. The international steering committee sets the guidelines, procedures and approves criteria and is composed of two representatives from FEE and two from the tourism industry. The day-to-day management is handled by the international coordination, which is based in an FEE secretariat in Denmark.
In Denmark
All Green Key members are reviewed, approved and continuously monitored by a jury consisting of the Danish Outdoor Council and HORESTA, while the Danish Environmental Protection Agency participates as an observer with influence on procedures and criteria. This composition ensures a good professional input to the operation and development of the ecolabel independent of special business interests.
At the same time, a SusDaneable network has been established with players from the entire industry, such as VisitDenmark, which acts as a professional board for Green Key in Denmark.
Find Bernstorff Castle on the Green Key website here: Bernstorff Castle - Green Key certified
What can you do as a guest?
As a guest at Bernstorff Castle - be it as a hotel guest, a guest at one of life's many celebrations or a professional guest at a meeting or conference, we hope you will contribute to the journey towards a better climate for all of us.
It may seem like small things, but in the big picture, together we can make a difference. Here's why:
- Reuse the towel in the room.
- If you stay with us for several days, consider using the same towel several times. Of course, we are happy to change them, so please help us. Leave your towel on the floor if you want them changed - if not, just leave them hanging on the hooks.
- Do you have to clean every day?
- Again - if you stay with us for several days in a row, consider the need for thorough cleaning every day. All our cleaning products are of course Nordic Swan Ecolabeled or otherwise green, but the savings on water and products help the environment for every drop we can save. Use the corresponding door handle marker to indicate whether you want cleaning or not.
- Sort your waste
- We sort our waste into 12 fractions and hope you will give us a hand. In all rooms and public areas, there are sorting bins where you have the opportunity to divide your waste into 3 main options - thank you in advance
- Drink tap water
- Denmark has some of the world's finest drinking water straight from the tap. Take the opportunity to fill a reusable bottle and help minimize plastic consumption and transport CO2 while staying hydrated and fresh.
- Turn off the lights / save water / turn down the heat
- Energy consumption is by far the biggest culprit in a hotel and conference center and Bernstorff Castle is no exception. Help us limit our emissions by turning off lights you don't use, taking shorter and colder showers and thinking about how warm you need your room to be.
