Sixteen city hotels will go green as part of the NYC Carbon Challenge, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the city 80 percent by 2050. 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge, 1 Hotel Central Park, Crowne Plaza Times Square, Dream Downtown, Grand Hyatt New York, Hotel Pennsylvania, Hudson Hotel, Loews Regency Hotel, Lotte New York Palace, The Pierre - A Taj Hotel, The Peninsula New York, InterContinental New York Barclay, InterContinental New York Times Square, Roger Smith Hotel, Waldorf Astoria New York, and the Westin New York at Times Square will join over 700 multifamily residential buildings, universities, hospitals, and companies that have already pledged to reduce their emissions by at least 30 percent in the next ten years.

Barnard College, New York University, and NewYork-Presbyterian/Queens are among the institutions that have already met that goal.

Mayor de Blasio announced the hotels' pledge today, predicting that their participation will reduce citywide GHG emissions by 32,000 metric tons and save approximately $25 million in energy costs.

"If some of New York's most iconic hotels can significantly reduce their carbon footprint, anyone can," de Blasio said. "NYC Carbon Challenge participants are joining City government in leading by example through the green retrofits all buildings should make."

Reducing emissions isn't just a good PR move for the major hotels signing on to clean up their energy: doing so will also cut costs associated with reducing energy waste, according to Donna De Costanzo of the Natural Resources Defense Council.

"The private sector plays an important role in meeting the City's climate change goals, and the Challenge demonstrates how taking steps to reduce emissions makes good economic, as well as environmental sense, for all," Costanzo said in a statement Tuesday.

The NYC Carbon Challenge has been around since 2007, but de Blasio announced a significant expansion back in September, at the same time as he introduced a "retrofit accelerator" that would allow landlords to renovate their buildings for maximum energy efficiency.

To be sure, it's going take a lot more than 16 local hotels to reverse the world's escalating warming trend—an interactive map released earlier this year showed how much of NYC will be under water if global carbon emissions are not significantly reduced by 2050. But maybe 16 is better than nothing?



