Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930

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Energy & Buildings

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Investigation and analysis of energy and water use of hotel buildings

in Tunisia
Houcem eddine Mechri a,b,⇑, Samir Amara c
a
Energy Department, Higher Institute of Applied Sciences and Technology So3usse, University of Sousse, Tunisia
b
Energy and Materials Laboratory, Higher School of Sciences and Technology of Hammam Sousse, University of Sousse, Tunisia
c
Agence Nationale pour la Maitrise de l’Energie, Tunisia

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This study provides an overview of energy and water use in hotel buildings in Tunisia. It is based on a
Received 6 September 2020 survey of energy audit reports performed on 137 hotels across the country. The results revealed that
Revised 23 January 2021 energy and water consumption are mainly related to room’s floor area, number of guest nights and num-
Accepted 14 March 2021
ber of food covers. The strength of the relationship depends on hotel standard. In addition, results showed
Available online 19 March 2021
a significant difference in energy and water use patterns between hotel standard’s, suggesting that 5-star
hotel establishments have to be handled apart. Furthermore, the breakdown of electricity uses indicated
Keywords:
that water chiller plants account for 29%, elevators, pumps, water-boost for 28% and lighting for 17%.
Hotel buildings
Energy consumption
Whereas the breakdown of thermal uses demonstrated the importance of space heating and domestic
Water consumption hot water accounting for the two-thirds of the total fuel use. On the other hand, energy and water per-
Use indicator formance indicators vary greatly from one standard to another and are extremely high in comparison to
Breakdown of energy use other Mediterranean countries. Finally, recommendations were put forward regarding the definition of
Statistical analysis energy/water performance benchmarks and retrofit solutions for hotel buildings in Tunisia.
Ó 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Despite these achievements, the tourist market remains vulner-

1.1. Tourism industry in Tunisia
In Tunisia, the tourism industry is one of the main pillars of the
national economy. In 2018, it accounted for 13.8% of the GDP,
including direct and indirect contribution. Moreover, it provided
employment to some 389 thousand people (11.1% of total employ-
ment) and covered 21.1% of the trade balance deficit [1,2]. The
international tourist arrivals rose by 90% over the last 20 years.
In 2019, establishment’s hotels welcomed 9.4 Million tourists with
a high risk of overtourism in many Tunisian governorates [3].
This performance was made possible through a large network of
hotels. In 2018, the stock of classified hotel buildings is 566 in
which 91% are spread along the east coast area. They offer 205
thousand beds in which 15% are located in 5-star hotels, 39% in
4-star hotels, 30% in 3-star hotels and 12% in 2-star hotel [4]. The
Tunisian tourism market is characterized by mass tourism, where
tourists are attracted by sandy beaches, and the growing offer of
the business model ‘‘all-inclusive hotels” [3].
⇑ Corresponding author: Higher Institute of Applied science and Technology
Sousse, Cité Taffala 4003, Tunisia.
E-mail addresses: hmechri@hotmail.com (H.eddine Mechri), samir.amara@
anme.nat.tn (S. Amara).
able to national and international security crises. The overall stabil-
ity and security in Tunisia are relatively high, but since the
‘‘Jasmine Revolution” in 2011, the tourism has experienced severe
problems due to political uncertainties, social movements and ter-
rorist attacks. For example, the tourism traffic recorded a decline of
35% in the number of visitors between 2010 and 2015 [3].
Consequently, the Tunisian hospitality sector is facing many
challenges, in particular the overtourism and the tourism traffic
instability. Overtourism causes many problems, especially water
stress and excess in energy demand. On the other hand, the tour-
ism traffic instability is associated with a high risk of inefficient
energy behavior of hotel buildings.
Another issue of concern in Tunisia is the critical energy situa-
tion. In fact, the energy deficit has been continued to increase since
a decade reaching a record of 52% in 2018, contributing by >60% to
the overall trade deficit. This deterioration is caused by the
strongly decrease on energy resources as well as the increase of
the international oil prices, while the national demand of energy
has continued to increase [1].
To meet energy and water challenges related to hotel buildings,
Tunisia has already announced many energy efficiency programs.
In particular, Tunisian government strongly encourages the energy
performance in the hotel sector by adopting a mandatory and peri-

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enbuild.2021.110930
0378-7788/Ó 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara
odical energy/water audit for large hotel buildings consumers.
However, the design and the implementation of appropriate
energy strategy require a priori an understanding of the energy
and water patterns of the hospitality accommodation sector. It is
into this context - hotel challenges and strained resources - that
the present work is being taken.
1.2. Literature review on energy/water performance of hotel buildings
Over the last 20 years many investigations on energy and water
use in hotel buildings have been carried out. Those studies covered
several countries such as China, Turkey, Greece, Italy, etc [5–8].
Most works focused on electricity consumption [5–9], some ana-
lyzed fuel use [7,9] but only few were interested in water con-
sumption [7,9]. The sample of investigated hotels ranges from 1
to about 300 hotels [10,11]. In addition, the literature review
showed that while a large number of papers investigated the over-
all energy use in hotels [12–15], far fewer addressed the use of
renewable technologies [16]. Besides, it turns out that most of
the studies used statistical and clustering techniques to analyze
building energy use [13,14,17,18]. Few researches investigated
building energy performance by software simulation [19].
As regards energy/water use analysis, typical variables were
considered for the investigation including year of construction,
gross floor area, occupancy rate, number of guest-nights, number
of guest rooms and standard rating [9,10,12–14]. Other works con-
sider uncommon variables such as district location, number of
employees and number of guests from different regions [5,15].
With regard to hotel’s energy use indicators, most of papers
reported energy intensity based on gross floor area [10,12,15,20],
while few studies used energy index based on guest-nights [5,10]
or number of guest rooms [8,20].
On the other hand, it is worth noting that only two studies were
carried in Southern and Eastern Mediterranean countries. Khemiri
et al. [21] and Ali et al. [22] reported the energy saving potential in
a 3-star Tunisia hotel and in 80 hotels in Jordan, respectively. For
the Northern coastal of the Mediterranean Basin, several surveys
were reported for Greece, Spain and Turkey [7,23,18,24]. However,
a few of them submitted a comprehensive and a comparable data
about the energy/water consumption levels [18].
1.3. Objectives and work methodology
This work is intended to provide a better understanding of
energy and water use in the Tunisian tourist accommodation sec-
tor. For this purpose, the paper presents the state of the art in
water and energy consumption in 137 hotel buildings. Next, it pro-
vides the key factors influencing the energy/water use. It also
investigates the breakdown of energy consumption by end-uses.
Finally, it reports energy and water use indicators in hotel build-
ings and compared to each other. Results are expected to support
policymakers’ efforts to reduce energy and water consumption in
the hospitality sector and to enable the hotel owners to monitor
their performance and to compare it over time.
To meet the stated objectives, we employed several statistical
tools, namely, descriptive analysis, correlation analysis as well as
graphical representations. The methodology adopted consists of
three steps:
Data collection and pre-processing: variable requirements were
defined with respect to the work objectives. Then, data were
collected and formatted. After that, data quality verification
was performed to identify missing data and outliers and there-
after handling missing data. This step will be discussed in sec-
tions 2.1.1 and 2.1.2.
2
Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930
Analysis of energy and water use: the collected data were ana-
lyzed using descriptive statistics, correlation analysis and scat-
ter plots. This step yielded to deeper understanding of energy
and water consumption and the identification of variables pre-
senting a strong correlation. Data related to energy breakdown
were investigated to identify end-uses with highest share.
Analysis of energy and water use indicators: once data under-
standing was gained, data transformation was made through a
normalization of energy and water consumption by the most
influential variables. Afterwards, various indicators were
obtained and analyzed using frequency distribution histograms
and parallel coordinate curves.
2. Data sample description
2.1. Data collection and pre-processing
2.1.1. Data collection
The purpose of this paper is to investigate energy/water con-
sumption in hotel accommodation sector. For such a goal, the sur-
vey was focused on energy/water uses and different variables
potentially impacting them. The gathered information is:
Energy consumption: data included electricity and fuel (gas or
LPG) consumption per year, breakdown of energy use: electrical
and thermal end-uses where it is available.
Water consumption: data included hot water and total water
consumption per year.
Operational variables: data included number of guest-nights,
occupancy rate, number of food covers on an annual basis, ser-
vices offered (spa center, aqua park . . .) and support services
(laundry facility and reverse osmosis unit).
Physical variables: data includes gross floor area, number of
guest rooms, number of beds, hotel standard, geographic loca-
tion and type of tourism (seaside, urban, desert).
For all the surveyed hotels, building energy consumption was
collected through fuel and electricity bills. On the other hand, in
order to breakdown the energy use, two sources were used by
auditors: records from sub-meters, while for hotels without sub-
meters, energy share was carried out gathering information on
operating schedule and rated power input of equipment. The elec-
tricity energy consumption of hotels was converted into primary
energy taking into account the efficiency of the Tunisian produc-
tion and distribution systems of electricity. Hotel water consump-
tion was collected through water bills and hot water recorded from
sub-meters. Data related to physical buildings and operational
hotels were provided by hotel’s administration. Table 1 summa-
rizes the different variables collected.
Data quality plays a critical role on results reliability and accu-
racy. Data collection process is the main step for data quality eval-
uation. Information was collected from 137 energy audit reports
carried out on hotel buildings. Energy audits were conducted by
auditors accredited by the National Agency of Energy Conservation,
in Tunisia, in accordance with requirements of the National Energy
Audit Guidelines [25]. The energy audit reports were checked and
validated by hotel representatives, accredited auditors and engi-
neers for the National Agency. Therefore, the collected datasets
presented in this paper are considered with good quality.
2.1.2. Data pre-processing
Data verification revealed that only 55 observations (out of 137)
were recorded for the attribute gross floor area (GFA). In addition,
in many cases, it was not clear whether the recorded areas were
referring to the building floor or the total hotel area or the
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930

Table 1 Fig. 1 displays the repartition of the sampled hotels across the
Definition of the collected variable. country. According to the Tunisian energy efficiency building code
Variables Variable Number of [28], the coastal hotels belong to the thermal zone, ZT1. This zone
name valid obs. is characterized by warm climate, small daily gap and humid sum-
Physical variables mer. While hotels within the region of Sahara belong to the ther-
hotel standard HS 135 mal zone ZT3, which is a desert region with hot summer, dry
gross floor area (m2) GFA 55 climate and important daily gap. The thermal zone ZT2 is an
number of beds NB 103
number of guestrooms NGR 111
upland region with hot summer, cold in winter (<0 °C) and impor-
type of tourism (seaside, urban, desert) – 135 tant daily gap.
geographic location – 135 The investigated 135 hotels represent about 36% of classified
gross floor area refereed to guest rooms GFAR – hotels in Tunisia. Table 2 explores the representativeness of the
(m2)*
studied hotels sample according to on one hand, the geographic
Operational variables location (6 resort regions all over the country) and on the other
number of guest-nights NGN 133
hand, the standard rating (not including 1* and 2* hotels). The
occupancy rate (%) OR 130
number of food covers NFC 85 studied specimens were compared to the total number of classified
offered services (spa, fitness, . . .) – 135 hotels all over the country [4]. Table 2 indicates that sample hotels
support services (laundry, osmosis plant, – 135 are fairly evenly spread, except in the case of 3* star hotels located
renewable energy) in Tunis where we got a small number. Subsequently, we claim
seasonal (yes/no) – 135
that the studied specimens are representative of the Tunisian
Energy consumption hotels’ infrastructure.
electricity consumption (toe)** EC 135
fuel consumption (toe) FC 135
total energy consumption (toe) TEC 135 2.2.2. Physical description
breakdown of electricity use (%) BEU 103 The hotels are medium to large sized accommodation with
breakdown of fuel use (%) BFU 103
guest room number varying from 150 to 679 for the 90% of the
Water consumption observed sample. Concerning the accommodation capacity, 50%
water consumption (m3) WC 111
hot water consumption (m3) HWC 86
of hotels had 496 – 756 beds. However, the gross floor areas vary
remarkably from 1 200 m2 to 90 000 m2 with a high coefficient
Otherwise using data provided by Ministerial Decree [26]: 31 m2 (5*), 27 m2. of variation (0.88) indicating a great level of dispersion. As regards
(4*) and 23 m2 (3*).
* star rating, 35 hotels were classified 5-star, 70 were 4-star and 30
assessed from data provided by energy audit report where it is available.
**
converted into primary energy 1 MWh = 0.2383 toe [27]. hotels belong to the 3-star category. Table 3 summarizes the statis-
tical description of the hotel buildings.
conditioned area. Consequently, gross floor area based on guest
rooms’ area, namely GFAR, was used as a reasonable alternative 2.2.3. Function description
of GFA. GFAR was calculated based on the number of hotel guest As shown in Table 3, the yearly average occupancy rate is 52%. It
rooms and the room area. The room’s area data were sourced from varies slightly with hotel’s standard, 4-star hotels show the highest
audit reports where it is available, otherwise using data provided occupancy level (57%), whereas 5-star show the lowest (46%). The
by the Tunisian Decree ‘‘minimum standards of classifying the coefficients of variation values obtained for NGN and NFC are high
tourist establishments providing accommodation services” [26]. (0.56) indicating a wide spread of hotel function. NGN and NFC are
On the other hand, data check showed that only two hotels are sea- significantly correlated regardless of accommodation standard
sonal. Then, they were eliminated from the database in order to not (R2 = 0.67), suggesting that day-guest and hotel worker numbers
bias the results. Another important source of bias concerns the were responsible for 33% of the variation of NFC.
detection of outliers. Since outliers may contain important infor- As regards energy utility equipment, fan coil units are used in
mation, we choose to analyze its later. Finally, 135 hotels were guestrooms with central chiller plants whereas constant air vol-
considered as valid observations. ume or variable air volume conditioning systems are employed
in open spaces. Hot water for sanitary use and for space heating
2.2. Building hotel description is produced by natural gas except for the region of Sahara and
the region of South-East where boilers use LPG. Among the 135
2.2.1. Geographic location hotels investigated, 12 have a reverse osmosis plant, 12 have a
Among the 135 investigated hotels, 130 are located in the coast spa and a gym-center, two hotels include aqua-park facilities and
while five hotels are located within the country in the arid desert 62 of the sampled hotels have on-site laundry. This indicates that
area, namely Sahara. The littoral area is subdivided in 5 coastal hotels are very dissimilar in respect of support and offered services
resorts regions: which may bias and complicate energy/water analysis.
Region of Tunis: It is the capital of Tunisia. The hotels located in
this region operate as business/resort hotels. Five are downtown 3. Analysis of energy and water use
hotels.
3.1. Energy mix
 Region of Hammamet Bay: It is the newest tourist resort region
in Tunisia. Electricity is the main source of energy. In average, it accounts
 Region of Sahel: It covers three governorates, i.e. Sousse, Mona- for 72% of total primary energy use. Comparable results were
stir and Mahdia. It is the oldest tourist resort region in Tunisia. reported in 30 New Zealander hotels (75%) [29], in 29 Singaporean
 Region of North-West: It covers the city of Tabarka. It is a new hotels (77%) [30] and in 16 Hong Kong’s hotels (73%) [31]. By con-
resort region. Hotels are located within a street band between trast, lower percentages were mentioned by Rossello-Batle et al.
the green mountains and the Mediterranean Sea. (56%) in 17 hotels in Balearic Islands, Spain [23] and by Bohdanow-
 Region of South-East: It covers the Djerba Island and the littoral icz et al. (49.3%) in 73 Hilton hotel chain [9]. This difference is
zone of Zarzis. mainly related to the climate condition where the buildings are
3
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930

Fig. 1. Geographic location of hotels.

Table 2
Breakdown of the sampled hotels by geographic location and standard rating compared to the total number of classified hotels.

Hotel standard
Geographic location 5* 4* 3* Total
Tunis 11/19 3/16 1/23 15/58
Hammamet Bay 12/18 24/37 8/29 44/84
Sahel 7/12 21/36 8/42 36/90
North-West 1/1 1/5 1/5 3/11
South-East 4/7 19/40 9/31 32/78
Sahara 0/3 2/7 3/11 5/21
Total 35/60 70/141 40/141 135/372

located. In fact, Tunisian hotels located in arid climate (Sahara while LPG for hotels located in remote area, i.e., the island of Djerba
region) are electricity intensive consumers with a mix reaching and the Sahara region. LPG represents 21% of the thermal energy
94%. Regarding thermal energy use, gas was used by costal hotels, use. Fig. 2 illustrates energy mix of the surveyed hotels.

4
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930

Table 3
Statistical summary of hotels data.

min max median mean coefficient of variation

2
GFA (m ) 1 200 90 000 14 632 19 457 0.88
GFAR (m2) 710 20 913 9 181 9 401 0.39
NGR 28 679 302 304 0.40
NB 149 1 872 644 654 0.42
NGN 4 688 385 089 111 912 120 282 0.56
OR (%) 15 92 53 52 0.31
NFC 9 968 776 484 253 916 285 895 0.56
EC (toe) 44 2421 585 649 0.53
FC (toe) 7 1314 221 247 0.70
TEC (toe) 51 2892 833 897 0.51
WC (m3) 1 075 181 184 66 491 66 609 0.52
HWC (m3) 307 45 283 13 003 14 495 0.56

3.2. Breakdown of energy use
The analysis of energy end-uses in hotels was restricted to 103
hotels, as the remaining hotels do not include reliable information.
Fig. 2 shows the average electricity breakdown for hotels. Water
chiller accounts for 29%, prime movers (elevators, pumps, water-
boost, and ventilators) for 24% and lighting for 17%, whereas cater-
ing and refrigeration accounts for 11% and 7%, respectively. On the
other hand, the breakdown of thermal uses shows the importance
of space heating and domestic hot water representing the two-
thirds of the total fossil energy use. Other fuel uses are 18% for
catering, the remaining thermal energy encompasses laundry and
swimming-pool heating. It is not evident to compare observed
results with other studies. Indeed, percentages estimation depends
mainly on weather conditions and requires accuracy on assess-
ment methods and a continuous monitoring.
3.3. Energy and water use analysis
As shown in Table 3, the coefficients of variation of TEC and WC are
high (0.52) indicating that total energy and water consumption vary
substantially from one hotel to another. 80% of the surveyed hotels
are considered energy intensive consumers (TEC > 500 toe/year)
and they are forced to a mandatory and periodical energy audit [25].
Correlation analysis based on R2 values was conducted on the
entire hotels sample between the dependent variables - energy
and water use- and the explanatory variables, GFA, GFAR, NGR,
NB, OR and NGN. The results are summarized in a correlation
matrix in Table 4. Several observations can be clearly emerged:
No correlation between GFA and the dependent variables. This
observation consolidates what was stated earlier in the section
2.1.2.
Correlations between occupancy rate and dependent variables
are very weak regardless of hotel standard. Same findings were
reported by Oluseyi et al. for 28 hotels accommodation in Lagos,
Nigeria [32] and by Xin et al. for 19 four and five-star luxury
hotels in Hainan, China [13]. This could be explained by the fact
that hotel indoor conditions were maintained independently of
tourist presence.
NFC shows significant correlation to EC than to FC. This might
be due to the fact that electricity consumption for the end-use
catering (72%11%=8%) is more relevant than that for fuel con-
sumption (28%18% = 5%).
R2 values for the whole sample (regardless of the hotel stan-
dard) are set out at the bottom of the Table 4. A very weak
dependency is observed suggesting that analyzing all hotels as
a single group is not an appropriate approach to explain the
variation on energy and water use. However, this statement is
not in line with the results of previous studies [10,15,29,32]
suggesting that R2 values are high regardless of the hotel
standard (Table 5).

Fig.2. Average energy breakdown for the sampled hotels.

5
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara
Table 4
Correlation matrix – R2 values.
R2-
value < 0.3 none or very weak effect size; 0.3 < R2-value < 0.5 weak effect size;
0.5 < R2-value < 0.7 moderate effect size; R2-value > 0.7 strong effect size [38].
Strong correlations are represented in dark gray shade cells, moderate correlation in
light gray cells, whereas weak correlations values are in bold character.
For 3-star hotels, results show a strong to moderate correlation
between energy/water use and the different explanatory vari-
ables. In particular, GFAR and NGN exhibit the highest R2 values.
Similar results were observed for 111 mid-market hotels in Eur-
ope [9]. Those strong correlations might be explained by the
fact that 3-star hotels do not offer services such as conference
facilities.
As regards 4-star hotels, correlations strength decreases but
remain significant for the two variables GFAR and NGN. There-
after, 4-star hotels were analyzed by service offered (spa) and
support service (laundry) to determine whether these factors
are likely affecting this correlation. Results, in Table 6, reveal
a strengthened relationship (strong to moderate correlation)
between energy/water use and GFAR/NGN for hotels equipped
with spa centers or laundry facilities. This observation indicates
that these services, which are more related to room-guests (at
the opposite of day-guests) presence, strongly affect energy
and water use in 4-star hotels.
For 5-star hotels, no significant correlation was detected even
analyzing either by services offered or support services. Analyz-
ing by geographic location shows also a very weak dependency
- with exception of hotel located in Sahel resort region (Table 7).
Indeed, Sahel region is the oldest tourist resort region in Tunisia,
and we can claim that there is a tradition of the good use of
energy and water. This would explain the observed correlation.
Nonetheless, there is no general rule to predict energy and
water consumption for 5-star hotel. Similar results were found
by Bohdanowicz et al. for a correlation analysis performed on 73
upscale brands hotel between TEC/WC and the key variables
NGN, NFC and GFA [9]. However, Xin et al. reported a strong
6
Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930
relationship between GFA and TEC (R2 = 0.77) for 19 four and
five-star luxury hotels in Hainan, China [13]. This is most prob-
ably due to the occupancy level which is too low in Tunisian 5-
star hotels (46%) in comparison to Hainan Hotels (63%).
Those observations reveal that energy/water use patterns of the
sampled hotels differ from one standard to another. Figs. 3–6 show
energy and water consumption as a function of the most influenc-
ing variables, i.e. GFAR and NGN. The correlation analysis was also
performed between energy-end use and the explanatory variables.
Observed results showed a coefficient of correlation <0.3 indicating
that is not interesting to further investigate this issue.
4. Analysis of energy and water use indicators
4.1. Indicators definition
From the correlation analysis, GFAR and NGN were found to
give the best correlation with hotel energy/water consumption.
Therefore, the following indicators were identified to be the most
suitable to represent the energy and water consumption levels:
energy use indicator per unit of GFAR, EUIa (kWh/m2) and
energy use indicator per guest-night, EUIgn (kWh/gn).
water use indicator per unit of GFAR, WUIa (liter/m2) and water
use indicator per guest-night, WUIgn (liter/gn).
4.2. Analysis of energy use indicators
4.2.1. Energy use indicator per GFAR
In Fig. 7, frequency distribution curves reveal that energy use
indicators vary substantially as a function of hotel standard. Energy
use indicator per GFAR goes from 400 to 800 kWh/m2 for 61% of 3-
star hotels and from 800 to 1200 kWh/m2 for 63% of 4-star hotels.
By contrast, 5-star hotels show a high dispersion of EUI5
a with the
highest average EUI5 2
a , at 1581 kWh/m . In addition, 15% (5 out 35)
of 5-star hotels record a very high EUI5 2
a >2400 kWh/m . Means
comparison of energy indicators reveals that two accommodation
types could be defined, i.e. 3-star/4-star hotels and 5-star hotels.
4.2.2. Energy use indicator per NGN
Frequency distribution curves of energy use per guest-night
show asymmetric distributions with the most observations are
within the range 50 to 100 kWh/gn (Fig. 8). 92% of 3-star hotels
have an<100EUI3 4
gn kWh/gn. 68% of 4-star hotels have an EUIgn rang-
ing from 50 to 100 kWh/gn. While for 5-star hotels, EUI5
gn show
similar characteristics as for EUI5
a distribution. 43% of the surveyed
5-star hotels exhibit a remarkably intensive EUI5
gn (>200 kWh/gn).
The average EUI5 gn is 219 kWh per guest-night which is one of
the highest values reported in literature in comparison to upscale
hotels in Europe (89.5 kWh/gn) and in Cyprus (24.2 kWh/gn) [9].
In the light of those observations 5-star hotel establishments have
to be handled apart. On the other hand, the wide variation of
energy indicators demonstrates large opportunities of energy effi-
ciency. Those opportunities are more related to the level of energy
awareness of hotel’s occupants and hotel management than to
energy systems optimization [35].
4.3. Analysis of water use indicators
4.3.1. Water use indicator per GFAR
In Fig. 9, frequency distribution curves of water use indicator
show that distributions are flattened for the different hotel stan-
dard. For 3-star hotels, WUI3
a are widely spread with a number
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930

Table 5
Coefficient of determination values in hospitality accommodation sector.

(See above-mentioned references for further information.)

Table 6
R2 values for 4-star hotels

(.) number of obs.

Table 7
Correlation between energy/water use and GFAR/NGN by geographic location for 5-star hotels

(.) number of valid obs.

Results for hotels in the south-east region are omitted because the valid observations are relatively low.

of observations from 1 to 3 within the different classes. Whereas
water use indicators vary within the range of 400–1000 L/m2 for
87% of the 4-star sampled hotels and within 500–1000 L/m2 for
75% of 5-star hotels.
4.3.2. Water use indicator per guest-night
The water use indicator distributions reveal a large discrepancy
not only between hotel standard but also within the same category
as illustrated in Fig. 10. The highest WUI5
gn was found in 5-star
hotel, with an average of 1044 L/gn. A visitor who spends a night
in 4-star hotel consumes on average a half (539 L) in comparison
to 5-star hotels. WUI3
gn average for 3-star hotels (479 L/gn) is close
to that of 4-star hotels. Outliers (>1500 L/gn) were detected for 5-
star hotels with very extreme values around 3000 L/gn for accom-
modation in the capital. The main causes of this discrepancy are
the presence of large green spaces, the use of reverse osmosis units

7
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930

Fig. 3. Total energy consumption against GFAR. Fig. 6. Water consumption against NGN.

4.4. Analysis of performance indicators of 5-star hotels

In order to understand the high dispersion and the high inten-

sity of 5-star hotels performance indicators, a parallel coordinate
curves as a function of geographic region are drawn in Fig. 11.
The values along the Y-axis are normalized with respect to the
maximum value of the performance indicator. The observed results
show that hotels located in the capital Tunis present by far the
highest indicators. This could be explained by the fact that those
hotels have the particularity to belong to accommodation business
providing luxury rooms and significant areas for conferences and
catering. In addition, a high variability of performance indicators
is noted with respect to hotels location. In particular, hotels located
in the region of Sahel show the lowest performance indicators. For
instance, EUI5 5
gn and WUIgn , in Tunis-hotels, are on average 4 times
higher than those located in the region of Sahel. This result con-
firms, what was stated in the section 3.3, i.e. hoteliers and person-
Fig. 4. Water consumption against GFAR.
nel staff are accustomed to the efficient use of energy and water
since Sahel-hotels are the oldest in Tunisia. Subsequently, they
are more conscious of energy and water uses.
Furthermore, based on the energy audit reports, it comes out
that some 5-star Tunisian hotels are well equipped with efficient
technologies such as efficient lamps, water-saving showerheads,
low-flush toilets, etc. Despite this, serious deficiencies remain in
terms of energy/water management. Improvements could be per-
formed at four different levels:

Awareness of hotel personnel: hotel staff must be conscious of

Fig. 5. Total energy consumption against NGN.
and the use of efficient technologies for water saving in some hotel
accommodations. A comparison of water use indicators with val-
ues from other countries reveals that tourists in Tunisia use a large
amount of water. For instance, Bohdanowicz et al. reported a water
use indicator of 516 L/gn for 73 Hilton (four and five star) hotel
chain [9] and styles et al. reported a water use of 1568 L/gn for
five-star Accor hotel chain [36].
8
their roles and responsibilities in the efficient use of energy
and water. A great care must be paid to the technical training
of engineering department staff on energy/water management
and basic energy-saving practices.
Smart management of facilities: a building management system
must be implemented to monitor and control the building’s
equipment (power, lights, HVAC, irrigation systems, . . .) for var-
ious common areas.
Efficient technologies for HVAC systems: Heating, ventilation
and air conditioning end-use is the biggest energy consumer
in Tunisian hospitality facilities (about 50% of primary energy).
Inverter technology for HVAC systems associated to smart key
card and smart thermostat offer substantial energy savings.
For example, smart card can automatically set temperatures
back when guests leave their hotel rooms.
Check and improvement: the proposed measures would be inef-
ficient without an energy team that measure and track energy/
water performance.
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930

Fig. 7. Frequency distribution of EUIa by hotel standard.

Fig. 8. Frequency distribution of EUIgn by hotel standard.

Fig. 9. Frequency distribution of WUIa by hotel standard.

9
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara Energy & Buildings 241 (2021) 110930

Fig. 10. Frequency distribution of WUIgn by hotel standard.

countries have similar climate conditions and the tourism sector

represents a major challenge for all the States. The comparison is
made on the basis of the indicator energy use by gross floor area.
For this purpose, the ratio GFAR/GFA is assessed through valid
observation of GFA for Tunisian hotels. Results show that floor area
of guest rooms occupied 61% of the gross floor area on average.
Similar values were reported in Taiwan’s hotel (68%) [20], in Singa-
pore’s hotel (64%) [15] and in China’s hotels (57%) [37]. Next, Tuni-
sian indicators EUIa were weighted with a factor of 0.61 and
compared to hotel’s indicators of several Mediterranean countries
as shown in Table 8. Results revealed that in the Northern Mediter-
ranean countries, the range of energy performance indicator varies
between 165.9 and 425.0 kWh/m2, which is much lower than val-
ues recorded in Tunisia (509.3–964.4 kWh/m2).

5. Conclusions and recommendations

Fig. 11. Parallel coordinates plot - mean performance indicators for 5-star hotels.
4.5. Comparison of energy performance across Mediterranean
countries
It is useful to make a comparison review on hotel’s energy/wa-
ter performance across the Mediterranean Basin to see where Tuni-
sian hotels stand with respect to others. Indeed, Mediterranean
This study gives a significant contribution to understand energy
and water consumption in hotel buildings in Tunisia. Based on the
investigated hotels samples, it emerges that electricity is the pre-
dominant energy consumption, accounting for 72%. Water chiller
is the main electricity end-use, accounting for 29% and space heat-
ing and domestic hot water represent the two-thirds of fuel use.
As regards the key factors affecting energy/water uses, it comes
out that GFAR and NGN contribute mainly on energy/water con-
sumption variability. However, the strength of the relationships
depends on hotel’s standard. Indeed, 3-star hotels follow uniform

Table 8
EUI reported in some Mediterranean countries.

Country EUI Additional remarks Reference

Portugal 165.9 kWh/m2 (4*) – 20.0 (sd) 5 – four star hotels [39]
196.0 kWh/m2 (5*) – 16.3 (sd) 8 – five star hotels
Spain - Balearic Islands 179.6 kWh/m2 (3*) 24.4 (sd) 9 – three star hotels [23]
199.8 kWh/m2 (4*) 35.0 (sd) 8 – four star hotels
Turkey - Antalya Region 425.0 kWh/m2 75.1 (sd) 32 five-star hotels [7]
Greece - Attica region 410.0 kWh/m2 177.3 (sd) 35 hotels [24]
Tunisia 509.3 kWh/m2 (3*) 183 (sd) 30 – three star hotels –
643.6 kWh/m2 (4*) 193 (sd) 70 – four star hotels
964.4 kWh/m2 (5*) 463 (sd) 35 – five star hotels

10
Houcem eddine Mechri and S. Amara
pattern with regard to energy/water use, 4-star hotels are charac-
terized by a less uniform pattern in comparison with 3-star hotels
and no consistent energy/water pattern for 5-star hotels.
Then, the assessment of energy/water indicators reveals that
Tunisian tourism accommodation is an energy and water intense
sector, in comparison with Mediterranean countries. It comes
out, in particularly that:
Three and four-star hotels can be clustered in the same accom-
modation group because there is not much difference between
3-star/4-star hotels with respect to their performance
indicators.
The strategy of mass-tourism adopted by Tunisian government
poses a significant issue with respect of energy and water
consumption.
Five-star hotels are highly energy/water intensive. For example,
3 3
EUI5 5
gn = 3:4  EUIgn andWUIgn = 2:2  WUIgn . Nonetheless, hotels
located in the resort region of Sahel present energy and water
indicators four times less than those located in the capital Tunis.
This is explained by the fact that Tunis hotels belong to accom-
modation business. Whereas hotels located in the region of
Sahel are the oldest and hotels staff are accustomed to the effi-
cient use of energy and water.
Following those conclusions, several recommendations can be
suggested. An energy/water management department should be
created in hotels with the implementation of a building manage-
ment system. At the level of the Tunisian National Agency of
Energy Conservation, as an energy policymaker, it is important to
develop a software tool to record dataset during energy audit pro-
cess. This tool will be able to detect outliers and abnormal values in
time. Moreover, Tunisian agency has to set performance bench-
marks by hotel standard. Finally, adopting a mandatory and peri-
odical energy/water audit for large hotel buildings consumers is
not sufficient without a compulsory implementation of energy effi-
ciency measures deriving from those audits.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgments
The authors thank the Tunisian National Agency of Energy Con-
servation (Agence Nationale pour la Maitrise de l’Energie), Tunisia
for its assistance.
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