Comfort Hotel Bergen Airport opened on the 28 of February 2017 and is Norway’s first BREEAM certified hotel building.
“The hotel is in a community where BREEAM certification is part of the regulation plan,” explains Arild Carter in Linstow Estate.
COMFORT HOTEL BERGEN LUFTHAVN vil bli Norges første BREEAM-sertifiserte hotellbygg. PHOTO: Inger Marie Grini
The BREEAM Certified hotel hosts 304 rooms and is the first building in the Bergen Business Park, a green development project with the ambition of becoming a driver in business development on the West Coast of Norway. All buildings in the area will be certified to BREEAM Very Good as a minimum, and the entire site will act as a pilot project for BREEAM Communities. The BREEAM assessments of both the hotel and site are using a Bespoke Criteria, where UK focused requirements are adapted to Norwegian conditions.
“The lessons of the certification are clearly positive,” says Carter. “It creates a focus in the project, and ensures both documentation and quality. Also, we’ve found that contractors and suppliers were well prepared, BREEAM-NOR is definitely becoming part of the everyday Norwegian build” said Carter.
The project aim is to certify to a Very Good rating, however, Carter believes an Excellent rating would have been the result if they had started with BREEAM earlier in progress. “The building is in effect very close to Excellent, and the possibilities were there.”
Carter is confident that BREEAM-certification gives good quality, but he cannot quantify the value of the certification yet. Nevertheless, he is sure that the market will eventually request certified buildings, even within hotels. Larger tenants and builders are already on track and are conscious of the benefits of environmentally friendly buildings. Eventually, individual, home buyers and tenants will follow suit. In case of future sales, the certification will have a value, but it is still difficult to fix this value completely.
Throughout the next 20 years the area around Bergen Airport Flesland will be a subject to large-scale development. This hotel is part of phase 1, which also includes three office buildings in a total of 18,000 square feet. The aim is to build a robust and innovative environment, associated with the traffic hub Bergen Airport Flesland poses.
The target group is national and international oriented companies who benefit from being close to the airport and can create innovation and growth in the region. The location ensures efficient and rapid communication both to Bergen City Centre, the rest of Norway and internationally.
Written by journalist Kjell Jørgen Holby, translated by Siri Dobloug of NGBC.
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