Low carbon luxury chalets: how we are reducing our impact

Renewable Energy

We’re excited that we can now share that all of our properties, including the chalets we run, our central kitchen and AliKats HQ, are powered by electricity from 100% renewable energy. This energy comes specifically from river fed dams as opposed to the more environmentally harmful reservoir fed dams, off the Rhone river in France. We are currently operating more than 10 properties (including our own home) on green energy. As our business grows we are committed to ensuring all premises continue to run on responsibly sourced renewable energy.

In our chalets we also use LED light bulbs and our central kitchen runs off a wood pellet boiler. Guests’ towel changes are also optional rather than mandatory to save on water and electricity.

Air source heat pumps

When it comes to heating, some of our chalets are heated through oil powered boilers. Wherever possible, we are working with chalet owners to install alternative heating systems based on renewable energy, such as air source heat pumps.

An air source heat pump is a clever system allowing us to generate our own renewable energy to heat our chalets by taking heat from the air and boosting it to a higher temperature using a compressor. It then transfers the heat to the radiators and underfloor heating. A bit like a refrigerator in reverse!

The remaining heat is stored in our hot water cylinder, which is used for showers, baths and taps. This energy-efficient system works in below zero temperatures, and is perfect for keeping our chalets nice and toasty, whilst reducing our carbon footprint.

Cutting down carbon emissions by making changes is our first step, but we are also calculating the remaining carbon emissions created in the running of our chalets so we can accurately mitigate them in responsible off setting projects. This means our guests can rest assured that their holiday with us will be carbon neutral.