Environmental and social sustainability policy is not only a new upcoming trend in the Russian property market, but also a vital necessity. Though the world community has long been considering how to maintain the delicate ecological balance: in 1990 the BREAM standard was accepted in Britain, which was later adapted into the LEED for the American property market.
Along with the generally accepted international standards almost every country has its own environmental standard system. According to the data as of 2009 represented by the King Sturge, the leading international property consultant, the most wide-spread standard in Japan is CASBEE, in Hong-Kong – BEAM, in Australia – Green star; the European countries have each developed their own national standards on the basis of the BREEAM standard as well – DGNB (Germany), NQE (France), Protocol ITACA (Italy).
As the problem of ecological standardization is becoming more and more acute in our country, the Russian Green Building Council (RUGBC) has been set up on May 18, 2009.
Since the time it was founded the Espro Group has been keeping up with the world trends, taking care of the environment at both construction and operation stages which is confirmed by international certificates: ISO 9001:2000 Quality Management System certificate by British Standards Institution, the world’s leading standards organization, was obtained in 2003 and regularly confirm. Besides, the Espro Group is the first Russian developer to be the member of the U.S. Green Building Council. The Espro Group intends to put into action the USGBC initiatives in the field of ecological construction on the Russian commercial real estate market.
The ecological sustainability of the Espro Projects is ensured by the following:
- environmentally safe construction materials
- Installation of resource saving technologies (water, electricity, heat);
- wastewater disposal and treatment for further technical use
- Minimization of polluting emissions;
- Collection and recycling of waste;
- Landscaping of the territory, comfortable working conditions.
The Espro Projects undergoes the state environmental review and use materials and equipment, certified on the territory of Russia. The high quality of the Espro Projects has been confirmed by the national award in the sphere of commercial real estate – «Kulon Baltia» in 2006 and «Kulon Istra» in 2009.
Espro Development’s Technical Standard consolidating the construction experience of the company, and setting high demands for quality and safety of objects. Construction quality control, introduction of new, advanced, efficient technologies and project designs is implemented by the construction management department, comprising of qualified engineers, designers and other specialists. Accident prevention and labor safety control on sites is carried out on a regular basis.
Although the application of new technologies increases the cost of construction, and despite the crisis we are inclined to view this as the investment into the future. The use of resource saving technologies would have positive effect on the operation of the project and surely will help save tenants money. According to the experts’ calculations, a 2-6% increase in the cost of construction because of new developments would finally result in a 15-30% reduction in electricity consumption and significant reduction in the operating costs.
We recognize our economic, social and environmental responsibility: strongly support the introduction of international standards requirements and ecological program of Greenpeace.
