Hotel and restaurant group Whitbread will be spending more than £7m this year in a programme designed to boost the environmental performance of its hotels, restaurants and coffee shops.

The move, focusing on Whitbread's existing estate, forms part of the company's 'Good Together' sustainability strategy and will help the business deliver against its targets of a 26 per cent reduction in energy consumption and a 20 per cent reduction in water use by 2020. As part of the programme, 20,000 low-flow showerheads will be installed at Premier Inn hotels, an initiative calculated to save enough water to fill 88 Olympic swimming pools a year by 2012.

Another element of the scheme will see £2.6m go towards installing low-energy LED light bulbs, an investment which Whitbread says will save an estimated 6,200 tonnes of carbon each year as well as reducing its energy bill. Further measures include investment in voltage optimisation, thermal building insulation, automated lighting systems, bathroom tap restrictors and dual flush toilets, renewable technology such as solar panels and micro combined heat and power and solar film.

Whitbread is also operating a sustainable new build programme, with construction currently underway on its second green hotel and first low-carbon restaurant. The Burgess Hill Premier Inn and Beefeater in West Sussex, due to open in autumn this year, follows Whitbread's green hotel pilot in Tamworth, Staffordshire which opened in December 2008.