London firm pledges sustainable programme for newly-acquired Bristol business park

More charging points and better Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) scores are being planned for Bristol’s City Business Park.

Orchard Street Investment Management acquired the six-acre freehold estate, based in Bristol city centre, on behalf of wealth management fund St James’s Place Property Unit Trust.

The £30 million sale includes 19 units totalling approximately 118,000 sq ft just off the A420.

Orchard Street said it plans to improve the site’s EPC ratings by installing solar PV panels and electric vehicle charging points, which it says is part of its long-term Net Zero carbon campaign.

According to Orchard Street, it will continue to acquire sites that have the potential to be adapted to its sustainability goals by improving its ESG results.

This ties in to Bristol’s own plans to be ‘carbon neutral and climate resistant by 2030’. The strategy has been designed by the One City Environmental Sustainability Board, which is made up of people from all areas and diversities.

The city has been criticised in the past for its suggested plans to expand Bristol Airport to cater for an additional two million passengers a year.

Critics say this does not fit into Bristol’s sustainability mantra, but rather, advocates of the expansion argue, there will be an additional 800 jobs in the city and £430 million brought to the South West economy.

Last year councillors voted against the move, and a decision by the Planning Inspectorate is pending after an appeal and public inquiry which ran from July to October last year (2021).

Meanwhile, the government cut grants for new electric cars by £1000. The Department for Transport (DfT) said this would mean more people would be rewarded as the lower grants meant taxpayers’ money would ‘go further.’

2021 saw an 89 percent rise in electric car sales, with almost 25 percent of new car purchases made in the last quarter of the year.