There are lots of companies that are doing their best to help the environment, and the travel industry is coming along and even offering some great innovations to help consumers Travel Green.

Learn more about Green Travel

Sustainable Travel International (STI) is a non-profit organization whose mission is to promote sustainable development and responsible travel by providing programs that help consumers, businesses and travel-related organizations protect the environmental, socio-cultural and economic needs of the places they visit, and the planet at large.

STI is dedicated to providing education and outreach services that will lessen the toll that travel and tourism takes on the environment and local cultures. By providing tangible, solutions-oriented programs, STI is taking a holistic approach to addressing global sustainable development within the travel and tourism industry.

TravelMatters is a website for those interested in learning more about how travel habits and transportation choices affect global climate change. TravelMatters offers a trio of resources–interactive emissions calculators, on-line emissions maps, and a wealth of educational content–to emphasize the close relationship between more efficient transit systems and lower greenhouse gas emissions

Planeta.com is the global journal of practical ecotourism. Find everything you want to know about eco-friendly travel: use its world guide to hundreds of locations around the world, read news about the industry, connect to responsible travel companies and read about relevant issues and topics related to eco-travel.

The Tree Hugger website has lots of links to other Green Organizations and has a radio show and a blog.

Air Travel Options

One way you can feel better about flying to Europe or elsewhere is to offset your carbon emissions. To “offset” carbon emissions means to first calculate how much carbon is released into the atmosphere, and then to either soak up an equal amount through tree-planting projects, or prevent an equal amount from ever being emitted by investing in renewable energy or efficiency projects that wouldn’t otherwise have happened.

Air Canada is offering a program for passengers to contribute to the carbon offset for their flights. They are working with an organization called Zerofootprint. There are other airlines that are doing the same. But even if the airline is not involved in a program,organizations like Zerofootprint can help you offset the carbon emissions from your flight.

Zerofootprint is a not-for-profit that combines the best financial engineering, environmental engineering, social networking tools and business intelligence to create products and services that help large corporations, organizations and individuals significantly reduce their environmental footprint. They also provide a great list of Green organizations to help you get green in a jiffy.

There are other organizations that perform the same service. The Green My Flight program in Canada allows travelers, corporations and responsible travel service providers to work together to address climate change by offsetting the greenhouse gas emissions from air travel activities. The Green My Flight Program is Ecologo Certified.

Atmosfair, located in Germany, is another organization that offers the same type of carbon offset program. The funds are invested in solar, hydro-power, biomass, or energy-efficiency projects and thereby contributes to neutralize greenhouse gas emissions by the same amount that would be comparable to the aircraft’s emissions.

Hotel Industry Examples

Kimpton Hotels has made a life-long commitment to environmental responsibility. Being environmentally responsible is not a one day job. It is a commitment and one that Kimpton is dedicated to for life. Every three months, new products and practices are introduced to Kimpton EarthCare, furthering their vision to reduce their impact on the environment. Of course, all the while they protect the high quality hotel experience their guests expect.

The Leading Hotels of The World, Ltd. (LHW) is the first luxury brand to, not only provide consumers the option of a having a carbon-neutral travel experience, but also to make the financial contribution on their behalf to offset their energy consumption.

The Leading Hotels of the World is proud to Lead the way in responsible travel by making the financial commitment to offset guest’s “carbon footprint”during their stay at any Leading Hotel.

The Green Hotels Association has great hints for packing and traveling green.