Circular parks
The circular economy is a “closed-loop” system that minimises waste and resource consumption. We’re rolling out the concept of “circular parks” to maximise sustainability, starting with our A-class office portfolio.
CTP is working to make its industrial and office parks more sustainable. We chose Spielberk Office Centre in Brno as a pilot project to discover what we could do to get to zero waste and greater efficiency in line with the principles of the circular economy. The Czech-based Institute of Circular Economics gave us a set of concrete recommendations that will make the functioning of the entire office park more eco-friendly. This includes things installing hot-air dryers in all bathrooms, which prevents nearly 80,000 tons of paper waste each year. Other initiatives include investing in better recycling containers and creating systems to enable our clients to easily recycle their office waste, including paper, printer toner, and bio waste. Best practices from the Spielberk pilot project will be transferred to our other office projects in Brno and Ostrava, in addition to our industrial portfolio wherever possible.
Solar plan
As part of our comprehensive sustainability initiative, starting in 2020 all of our new buildings will be constructed “solar ready.” We’ve also formed a partnership with a company that sources and resells 100% renewable energy to enable our clients to purchase 100% renewable, always-on energy at costs rivalling or below standard utility charges. Currently our solar target is to develop 20MW of electricity capacity in the Czech Republic during 2020.
Over the years, CTP has installed many solar plants on the rooftops of our buildings. Currently, we have eight functioning solar farms in the Czech Republic. As part of our comprehensive sustainability initiative, starting in 2020 all of CTP’s new buildings will be constructed “solar ready”—meaning either that the roofs will be built to allow the creation of a solar farm on each building by incorporating the necessary hook-up technology, or they will be built with solar panels already installed. In January 2020, CTP began a partnership with Nano Energies—a company that sources and resells 100% renewable energy—to enable our clients to purchase 100% renewable, always-on energy, at costs rivalling or below standard utility charges. This will be a major advantage for our clients and is only possible due to the scale and scope of the CTPark Network. Currently our target is to develop 20MW of electricity capacity in the Czech Republic during 2020. Our solar initiative allows CTP to offer renewable energy to our tenants in those parks that have it, lowering their operational costs while at the same time providing them with a viable source of renewable energy for their own sustainability goals.
CTForest
A key pillar of our net carbon neutral strategy is the purchase and maintenance of natural forests in the countries where we operate. To this end, CTP has committed to investing in forest preserves across CEE on a 1:1 ratio to our built portfolio.
A key pillar of our net carbon neutral strategy is the purchase and maintenance of natural forests in the countries where we operate. To this end, CTP has committed to investing in forest preserves across CEE on a 1:1 ratio to our built portfolio. As a first step, in October 2019 CTP purchased its first forest preserve outside Mladá Boleslav in the Czech Republic. The entire 100-hectare forest will be preserved in its natural state and will be managed by expert staff to encourage biodiversity, which will also protect against the bark beetle infestation that is ravaging the Czech Republic’s coniferous forests. CTP will plant a variety of trees to both offset our carbon footprint and also to provide genetic diversity to help battle the bark beetle infestation, which is a direct result of low-biodiversity resulting from mono-culture planting and over-forestation. CTP continues to seek other, old-growth forests across CEE to preserve, as they are the best type of carbon sink: wild, bio-diverse, old-growth forests are up to 40 times more effective at capturing carbon than a new-growth, managed tree farm.
