Arriving in this unspoiled place at the end of the 90’s, our concern has always been to set up facilities with the lowest impact on environment. Eco-management means that ecological thinking (and not eco-marketing) drives technical and organizational choices to preserve nature and support people. With permanent self-criticism (and humility considering the carbon footprint due to flying transportations induced!), we keep trying our best!
Materials
Selected as much as possible for their ecological advantages and contribution to local economy. For instance, bungalows are mainly built with rapid growth materials (bamboo, coconut trees), boat recycled and floating woods, or local trees (eucalyptus, teak,…), and thatched roof. Mattresses are handy crafted and filled in with kapok (fibber from local tree) which avoid to produce synthetic waste, and moreover is naturally anti-accarians. Plates are potteries made in a neighbouring village, etc…
Water supply
Freshwater is fetched from Alor Kecil village for shower and kitchen (of course there is freshwater !…) and seawater is used for sanitation system. Alor-Pantar’s strait islands regularly suffer from aridity and water is a fundamental issue. We appreciate that our guests are aware about the limited ressource !
Laundry service is provided by Kepa’s women who wash in Alor Kecil.
Energy
We have installed sustainable resource with solar panels. Lighting is available 24 hours in all the rooms. A 220V charging station is available in the restaurant room (from 7:00 until 20:30), while exclusive bungalows have their own 220V terminal. We also have a quick-charger for rechargeable AA batteries. No Air-conditioning neither fans, but the bungalows are built on the rocks, a few meters above the beach, so we catch well the sea breeze (which make even the night cold by some seasons! then we give blankets!).
Waste management
While the organic wastes feed goats and chicken or are composted, bottles, cans, hard plastics, and evn plastic bags now, are sent to recyclers. The garbage left, which is very limited due to our local consumption habits, is burned in a home-made incinerator with neutralization of the smoke. Wastewaters are separated for bio-filtration and/or plantations. Electronics and small batteries don’t have recycling channel here, so we appreciate our guests are taking them back.
Diving
The new boat is a wooden speed boat built in Lombok 2017. We could avoid glass-plastic/fiber-glass with this light wood locally grown, but it still needs paint, and fuel unfortunately! However, we chose 4 storkes HONDA engines, which are not using oil-fuel mix combustible (so not releasing oil in the sea), and which has the higher efficiency in order to limit carbon emissions. Light and pumps energy is provided by solar panel. On land, compressors to fill tanks also need fuel small engine as we can’t power them with solar so far… The black spot of our energy supply… Hope we find better solution the future!
The (dream) Team !!
Carpenters from both coastal and mountain tribes built the houses, with limited tools and traditional rules (which make the rustic but authentic style of Alor!), although we customized the design. The land and boat’s staff is from Kepa island and Alor Kecil village. Some of them are here since we started (17 years already…), we know others since they were kids… These Alor characters are the family of La P’tite Kepa!
