Bergen Business Park awarded the title of Project of the Month for January 2021 by Grønn Byggallianse

The Project of the Month for January impresses with its systematic approach to sustainability. All completed buildings on the Bergen Business Park in Flesland are certified as BREEAM-NOR Excellent, and office buildings are energy grade A.

The area development has a BREEAM Communities certificate for the design phase, and is now working on BREEAM In-Use certification for operation.

The environment as the theme

Linstow’s Regional Director in Bergen, Arild Bruvik, is proud of the solid BREEAM focus.

– We are proud that the environment is the theme from start and into the lifetime of the buildings. We went for BREEAM-NOR Very good in the regulatory provision at the least, which is pretty unique.

So far, a hotel and two office buildings have been completed. 30,000 of 170,000 m2 have been built, and 800 of 7,000 office spaces are ready for use.

Good environmental solutions make financial sense

In addition to its BREEAM ambitions, Linstow has its own system for greenhouse gas reporting for our entire property portfolio. As from Q1 2021, we report the effects of greenhouse gas from each building, which will be used for reduction targets for 2022.

Bruvik explains that Linstow’s motivation for its sustainability ambitions are two-fold.

– We start with our social responsibility and duty to meet out common goals. We also see this as natural progression, and believe it would be a mistake to slip behind. We want to offer great premises to tenants, and given that they have become more concerned about the environment, it becomes even more important to be able to deliver, he says.

An important criterion for success has been making the ambition clear right from the start.

– We announced our environmental ambitions right from the beginning and in procurement, and used them to select our partners. We’ve applied the UN Sustainability Goals in our design meetings, and checked off what we can contribute to.

Linstow also found that its environmental solutions made sound financial sense.

– Our unambiguous ambitions have also contributed to better relationships with contractors, architects and consultants, helping to avoid conflict. A complicated construction process only costs money. But with common ambitions, we can also deal with other problems at an early stage, explains Bruvik.

A fully digital construction site, where everyone has access to the latest version of drawings online, has meant fewer mistakes and double work.

– Circular economy has been more of a challenge, including obstacles to reclassifying materials. It’s important that rules don’t get in the way of re-using materials. But we can now see movement from the authorities on this, says Bruvik.

Learn more on the project and award here