Sustainable Tourism Innovation and Destination Competitiveness: Assessing the Economic Value of Low-Carbon Tourism Practices

Destinations are under growing pressure to reduce the carbon footprint of tourism, yet decisions to adopt lowcarbon practices are usually judged on environmental grounds alone, and the economic case is rarely set out in a form that managers, investors, and destination agencies can use. This study develops an evidence based framework
for assessing the economic value of low-carbon tourism practices and for asking whether they strengthen destination competitiveness. It synthesizes peer reviewed work on tourism emissions, destination competitiveness, hospitality energy economics, green demand, eco-efficiency, climate risk, and governance. The evidence shows that lowcarbon
operations in accommodation can lower unit costs, that stated preference studies often find a willingness to pay for green attributes that is limited by an attitude behaviour gap, and that emissions are dominated by travel to the destination, which operators cannot control. Direct evidence that links low-carbon practices to destination level competitiveness outcomes is thin. The paper therefore proposes a five stream value model (cost savings, price and demand premium, mix and yield, resilience, and valued externalities), derives a marginal abatement cost, a break even price premium, a market level eco-efficiency identity, and a decoupling condition, and introduces a Low-
Carbon Destination Competitiveness Index (LCDCI) that aggregates four pillars with a geometric mean. Illustrations with assumed parameters show that some practices pay for themselves while a full programme needs a premium or a carbon value, that source market mix can change eco-efficiency more than property level measures, and that
efficiency alone does not stop emissions from rising when arrivals grow quickly. The central implication is that low-carbon tourism practices raise destination competitiveness when they are bundled, verified, and paired with a value-over-volume market strategy.