“Vastint is a developer with 35 years of experience. We did not compromise on quality, even if we negotiated the contracts very hard. We have to be innovative and we rely on volumes to obtain the best possible prices for materials and workmanship.

At the moment, Vastint Romania has 100,000 square meters for lease in 2 major projects. Business Garden Bucharest is in the top 3 worldwide from the point of view of LEED Platinum certification.

The Timpuri Noi Square project has 53,000 square meters that have been developed and rented and we have started the second phase. We are constantly trying to move things forward, and at the Timpuri Noi project we managed to completely eliminate fossil fuels for the second phase of development,” Antoniu Panait, Managing Director, Vastint Romania said during Sustainability in Business Forum organized by The Diplomat-Bucharest and Sustainability Today.

“We built a very efficient team and outsourced a lot of the activity. I have 16 colleagues who are very dedicated, have a lot of experience and I don’t need to explain to them what the carbon footprint means or how we reduce this footprint.

We have a business where the result comes after 3-4 years. What do I mean? Everything starts with choosing the location, choosing the land. When you choose the land, you think about where the employees of your future tenants are, how far they live, if they have anything to bring, if they have a metro station nearby.

Imagine that the offices are not near a subway station, and the 10,000 people should come to work by car. From the demolition of the buildings on the purchased land, crushed concrete is produced, which we later use in the construction of roads, another method of reducing the carbon footprint.

There are many ways to reduce your carbon footprint. We removed the gas power plant for the second phase of the Timpuri Noi Square project and we use heat pumps, we installed photovoltaic panels.

We have done many things, but we are still learning, we are eager to learn new things. I hope that greenwashing will disappear soon, because in our field it is a very common phenomenon.

Things are changing for the better and at a very fast pace. 76 percent of the office portfolio in Europe is not compatible with ESG and major investments are needed in this sector. We have to be responsible, because the buildings we build have a lifespan of at least 50 years.”