Next month, the EPA ‘s procurement staff will begin asking hotels and convention centers a list of green questions that it will consider when evaluating bids for EPA business, the International Herald Tribune reports.

The agency, which spends about $50 million on travel annually, much of it for meeting spaces, hopes its own purchasing power will influence behavior.

The General Services Administration, which sets policy for all government travel (about $13.5 billion in annual federal spending) is amending its own rules to suggest that meeting planners throughout the government consult the EPA checklist.

The environmental agency will not verify a hotel’s answers and travel bookers can still accept bids from hotels that do not pass.