# Identifying Energy-Use Behavior and Energy-Use Profiles of Hotel Guests
## 1 Introduction  
In the United States, there are about 47,000 hotels, spending an average of $2200 per room on energy each year [1]. Studies have found that occupants' energy-related behavior is one of the main factors that affects energy consumption in hotel buildings [2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11]. Moreover, occupants' energy-related behavior (e.g., actions or reactions of a person to adapt to ambient environmental conditions such as temperature, indoor air quality, and sunlight) also constitutes a leading source of uncertainty in predicting energy use of buildings [7, 12, 13]. Accordingly, this study focuses on identifying the energy-use behavior and energy-use profiles of hotel guests to provide decision makers (e.g., hotel owners and hotel managers) with a better understanding of their guests' energy-related behaviors.  
Although occupant energy-related behavior has a significant impact on reducing energy consumption in hotel buildings, there are many challenges that result in an inaccurate estimation of the energy consumption level of occupants in hotel buildings: (1) guestsare not responsible for paying electrical bills [14]; (2) guest satisfaction is the number one priority in hotels to provide maximum comfort, convenience, and a positive brand experience for their guests [1,10]; (3) guests feel less restricted with their daily life routine [14]; (4) guests in the same room may behave differently due to diversity in guests' behavioral patterns [12,15]; (5) energy reduction efforts in hotel buildings have majorly focused on behaviors that save relatively small amounts of energy (e.g., unplugging one's cell phone charger), while other more effective behaviors (e.g., turning HVAC off when not needed) have been neglected [9]. Therefore, there is a pressing need by the decision makers of the hotel industry (e.g., hotel owners and hotel managers) to design and deliver effective and practical interventions for hotel guests to reduce their energy consumption.  
There are several studies that have investigated various energy reduction strategies primarily focusing on the observation, understanding, and prediction of occupants' energy-use behavior in commercial and residential buildings [2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11]. These strategies include: (i) the challenge to increase the knowledge of occupants about energy-related issues, encouraging them to change their behaviors for the better and, at the same time, to monitor and assess the occupants' energy-related behaviors in a short or limited period of time [16]; (ii) occupant energy use data/feedback to compare occupants' current energy use with their historical use and monitor progress [6, 16, 17, 18, 19]; (iii) rewards/penalties to offer incentives to change occupants' behavior or to force extra administrative costs of regulations and sanctions on occupants [7,8,20]; (iv) technologies to save energy without any human involvement by retrofitting existing buildings and/or installing high energy-efficient products (e.g., energy-efficient light bulbs and occupancy sensors) [8,15,20]. Despite the significant contributions of these research studies on analyzing the impact of occupants' behavior on energy performance of residential and office buildings, there is little or no research study that provides practical and efficient energy-use reduction strategies based on occupants' energy-related behavior in hotel buildings. To address this research gap and overcome the aforementioned challenges for hotel buildings, this study aims to develop a model that analyzes the impact of hotel guests' energy-use behavior and energy-use profiles on hotel buildings' energy consumption. To achieve this, the study will first develop and then implement an integrated framework to measure the energy-related behaviors and intentions of hotel guests.