Josef Wiedermann says the Austrian developer is betting on timber construction to navigate rising costs, while actively hunting for new permit-ready acquisitions in Prague

UBM Development has pivoted decisively away from hotel and office projects in Prague, concentrating its entire Czech operation on residential development. It’s a strategic shift driven less by ideology and more by cold arithmetic—offices simply don’t pencil out anymore in the current market, according to Josef Wiedermann, head of UBM’s Czech operations.

UBM’s recent track record tells the story of this transition. Following the successful sale of the final unit at Neugraf on Smíchov, a 50-50 joint venture with Crestyl, and the completion of the 138-apartment units Astrid Garden, UBM is now pushing forward with Rezidence Na Plzeňce. It’s a 160-apartment units development in Smíchov the construction of which has already begun. The project’s performance validates the residential strategy. Having launched in January the moment the building permit came through, Wiedermann’s already secured over 50% pre-sales.

Meanwhile, the company is wrapping up sales at Arcus City in Stodůlky. This is a three-phase, 278-unit project notable for featuring Prague’s first multi-story timber residential buildings. Only 6 apartment units remain from the total inventory, proof that rising prices haven’t cooled buyer appetite.

Rather than slowing down, Wiedermann says he’s actively pursuing new acquisitions, particularly in Prague 4, seeking permit-ready residential projects that can move quickly to market.

The shift toward timber construction represents more than environmental posturing—it’s a pragmatic response to a quietly growing labor crisis. “Finding someone young enough to work on a construction site who can actually do the work is essentially a superhuman task,” Wiedermann says. The problem remains even for employers offering competitive wages.

This labor shortage isn’t improving. Construction crews increasingly comprise workers from Ukraine and even more distant countries, creating language barriers that risk having an impact on quality. What happens once the war in Ukraine ends is anyone’s guess. Wiedermann warns that once these workers return home, the construction sector faces potential paralysis.

Timber construction offers a partial solution by shifting work into controlled factory environments, reducing on-site labor requirements. Following regulatory changes this summer that now permit hybrid construction up to 22.5 meters without special exemptions—roughly seven stories—timber has become commercially viable for Prague’s market. UBM’s next project will leverage these new parameters.

Developer margins have held remarkably steady. “We still work with roughly the same margin, which is somewhere around 15-20%,” Wiedermann explains, reflecting the risk profile of residential development. What’s changed is everything underneath: land acquisition costs, protracted permitting processes, construction expenses, and dramatically higher capital costs.

The math is unforgiving. Buy a plot at today’s elevated prices, spend several years navigating permits while servicing debt at current rates, now far higher than the 3% of not so long ago. These aren’t temporary dislocations—they’re structural shifts that make meaningful price corrections unlikely.

The market is also evolving compositionally. Where one-bedroom units once dominated small apartment projects, two-bedroom layouts are gaining share. Wiedermann says that with rental rates climbing, two income-earning tenants can better support lease payments, making these units more attractive to investors without proportionally higher costs.

UBM’s willingness to pursue new acquisitions while construction costs remain elevated and labor scarce signals a longer view: they’re betting these conditions persist.

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According to an internal Savills survey, just 14% of properties hold Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs) in top A or B classes. The majority rate C or below—or lack available data entirely, typically indicating older buildings. The cynical assumption has to be that they have questionable energy credentials and are avoiding disclosure of their performance metrics.

The current EPC process itself suffers from fundamental limitations that undermine market transparency, says Jan Jurčíček, Head of Building & Project Consultancy at Savills. He claims certificates often overestimate performance in older buildings due to outdated methodology, or underestimate efficiency when post-certificate improvements aren’t reflected.

Technical due diligence reveals actual energy consumption frequently exceeds EPC projections by tens of percent, as certificates rely on model parameters like 20-22°C indoor temperatures that rarely match operational reality.
ESG Consultant Barbora Jansová warns against treating EPCs as sustainability guarantees. She claims they assess only energy performance against legislative requirements—not overall carbon footprint.

Various decree versions create incomparable ratings with no official conversion methodology. Nonetheless, banks still have to consider EPCs as measurable ESG inputs for portfolio assessment.

The EPBD IV directive, due for implementation by May 2026, transforms voluntary recommendations into binding obligations. Minimum energy performance standards will mandate renovating 16% of least efficient buildings by 2030 — 26% by 2033. New construction from 2028 must achieve near-zero emissions.

Recommendations will gradually transform into enforceable sanctions. Building renovation passports will accompany updated EPCs, outlining improvement plans toward zero-emission stock by 2050. All of which means that the vast majority of property owners will need comprehensive energy assessments in order to understand the true performance of their properties.

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Home photovoltaic power plants performed very well during the July blackout. There was sunny weather that day, so most systems with battery storage had enough energy for basic household operation. However, it’s important to remember that the goal of these systems is not to enable unlimited consumption – for example, doing laundry all day or running air conditioning at full blast. The generated energy needs to be used efficiently because it’s uncertain when the grid will be restored or whether weather changes might significantly limit production. The backup principle is simple – the system switches to so-called backup mode, either manually or automatically through smart controls. The Infigy system optimizes energy consumption in which the transition to backup mode is handled by an inverter. It then ensures that non-essential appliances don’t unnecessarily drain the battery.

Did widespread home voltaics cause the blackout, help prevent it, or are they part of the solution?

According to official information from ČEPS, photovoltaic power plants had no direct influence on July’s outage. The cause was purely a technical failure on line V411. This was a mechanical failure, not a problem caused by decentralized energy production. More generally though, households equipped with battery storage can help stabilize the rest of the distribution network in such cases. By blocking energy consumption from the grid or switching to island mode, they reduce pressure on the infrastructure and contribute to faster restoration of balance.

What impact do home systems have compared to large solar power plants?

We don’t have precise figures for a direct comparison of the impact of home systems versus large installations (e.g., corporate, or municipal). Generally, however, the two forms of production complement each other. Home systems are beneficial especially from the perspective of decentralization and relieving the distribution network. Thanks to them, it’s possible to produce and consume energy directly at the point of need, which increases efficiency and reduces transmission losses. Large power plants, on the other hand, offer more stable output and play a key role in the overall balance. The combination of both types of production – together with smart control and storage – is key to resilient and flexible energy systems of the future.

So, do you think they help diversify energy sources instead of creating more problems than solutions?

Home photovoltaic power plants significantly contribute to the diversification of energy sources in the Czech Republic. This is a renewable, local, and ecological energy source that is independent of fossil fuels. Thanks to energy being consumed directly at the point of production, there is lower load on the transmission system, higher household self-sufficiency, and smaller distribution losses. They’re also an efficient use of roof space that reduces the need to acquire and fill land, which is another ecological advantage. However, it’s crucial that these sources are smartly controlled. All renewable sources have variable output – for example, photovoltaics depend on sunlight. Thanks to platforms like Infigy, it’s possible to synchronize consumption with production so that as much energy as possible is used while the the sun is shining. That’s the way to ensure stability of the entire system while getting the most out of the energy that’s generated.

Jiří Šizling is co-owner of Infigy

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According to confidential documents obtained by Handelsblatt, the CDU proposes restarting these facilities—potentially through state ownership if current operators remain reluctant. “The plants have the potential to produce electricity safely, cost-effectively, and in a climate-friendly manner for another two decades,” argues CSU Bundestag member Andreas Lenz, who participated in recent coalition climate discussions.

The timing is critical. Every day of continued dismantling makes revival more technically challenging and expensive. CDU leader Friedrich Merz and CSU’s Markus Söder have labeled the nuclear phase-out a “historic mistake” that has undermined Germany’s industrial competitiveness amid high energy costs.

Martin Pache, Germany head of US nuclear company Westinghouse, sees no obstacles to extending reactor lifespans by 20 years: “In international comparison, operating lives of 60 years are now common for nuclear power plants. In the USA, license extensions to 80 years are already being implemented.”

Obviously, the plan faces substantial resistance, and it’s not just from the usual anti-nuke crowd. Nuclear operators RWE, E.ON, and EnBW appear thoroughly disillusioned after decades of policy whiplash—from the initial 2000 phase-out, to the 2010 extension, followed by the post-Fukushima reversal and the contentious final shutdown debate. CEO statements suggest minimal appetite for re-engaging with nuclear operations without substantial financial guarantees.
E.ON’s Leonard Birnbaum put it bluntly, telling Handelsblatt “We clearly want to dismantle. And we have absolutely no desire for delays from the political arena.”

The proposal envisions Uniper—the nationalized energy company that already operates nuclear facilities in Sweden—as a potential federal operator. But significant hurdles remain: changes to the Atomic Energy Act would trigger lengthy legal challenges, technical expertise has scattered, and billions in shutdown compensation might require repayment.
With the SPD firmly opposed to nuclear revival, Germany’s energy future hangs in the balance of coalition politics. It’s frankly still unclear if is this a serious policy pivot, or merely political positioning.

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By agreeing to participate, companies create an opportunity for management to ask potentially awkward but revealing questions about their company culture, management style, and employee efficiency and motivation. The assessment’s value is backed by the fact that banks increasingly consider GRESB scores when making lending decisions, seeing it as a worthwhile measure of a company’s viability. A growing number of institutional investors also include the GRESB score in their ESG due diligence, assuming that a seller with a high GRESB score presents a lower investment risk.

Mint Investments has embraced this approach despite a recent European climbdown on ESG requirements, including significant changes to the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD).

“Where CSRD is complex and purely on reporting, the GRESB is a much more accessible way to showcase and give guidance on improving sustainability performance,” explains sustainability consultant Steffen Walvius. “Since it scores a company’s performance plus benchmarks with peers, it gives much more benefits to an organization.” His company Walvius Partners works with companies around Europe as a consultant on the process.

While environmental metrics are important, they represent just one component of the GRESB assessment, which evaluates companies across three key areas: Management (strategy, leadership, policies), Performance (energy consumption, emissions, water usage + waste generation), and Development (ESG implementation during construction phases).

Sebastien Dejanovski, a founding partner of Mint Investments, the first Czech company to participate in GRESB, describes the process as motivational: “It’s like going to school. You don’t really want to study. But then, when you realize what it means to learn about things, you understand that the GRESB process benefits you a lot. It’s enabled us to be much more effective in property management.”

Mint Investments has seen its GRESB score rise from 33 in 2021 to 75 currently, with each improvement driving tangible business benefits. And it’s not just useful in terms of managing its assets better…it’s better for the whole company’s management.

An example is the employee survey Mint carried out at the beginning of the process. Anonymous employee feedback collected through the process highlighted issues with the company’s office space. This eventually convinced the company’s partners to invest in a new workspace despite having several years left on their existing lease.

“GRESB is like introducing extra sensors,” Walvius explains, describing it as a powerful  management tool for companies. “If you’re flying a plane and you’re in the cockpit, you want to have as many meaningful measurements as possible to make sure you’re flying correctly.”

A key strength of the GRESB framework is its sector neutrality through peer group comparisons. Companies are benchmarked against others in the same sector—data centers against data centers, warehouses against warehouses—ensuring scores reflect relative ESG performance rather than absolute judgments about the sector itself.

Unlike many property companies that struggle to collect complete energy consumption data from its tenants, Mint stands out with 100% coverage of its portfolio. “Many institutional investors can maybe reach 40% of the floor area where they know utility consumption,” noted Walvius.

This transparency has become a significant advantage in transactions and financing. Banks like ING offer better rates to companies with strong GRESB scores, and Mint’s credentials helped them secure distribution of their residential fund through ČSOB, which controls 30% of the Czech market.

“When people ask me how it’s possible that ČSOB is distributing our fund like the first one ever in Czech Republic, one of the reasons is that we understand their requirements,” says Dejanovski.

The GRESB system is designed to encourage continuous improvement. At the beginning of the process, companies have a “grace period” during which scores aren’t made public. From then on, the assessment calendar follows a clear annual cycle. The portal opens on April 1, with submissions due by July 1. Following validation and benchmarking in August, preliminary results are released to participants on September 1, with a two-week correction period. Final results become available to participants and investors on October 1.

Implementing GRESB gradually over multiple years appears to yield the best results. “Having a gradual approach is very important because you make sure that people don’t hate GRESB and you have time to really pick the things that you think are important first, slowly introduce it,” explained Walvius. “If you’re really a late adapter and you do it only when a bank is asking it and then you have a year to scramble, that’s not a very good point.”

The structure of the rating regime makes it impossible to score 100 points, creating ongoing incentives for enhancement.

As ESG requirements face political headwinds in some regions, Mint’s leadership believes a pragmatic approach to sustainability practices delivers business value regardless of regulatory changes. “If you truly embrace it, if you’re brutally honest with yourself and accept that you don’t actually know that much…then you can really start to understand. Our people are proud now that we have the GRESB,” said Dejanovski. “It’s no longer a lot of work because the process have become efficient.”

For companies still on the fence, Dejanovski’s conclusion is straightforward: “I think the biggest risk is not to do it.”

Walvius Partners recently became an official partner of GRESB, making it the first official service provider in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

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Earlier in the year, CTP and DHL Supply Chain completed the transformation of a warehouse in CTPark Pohořelice into a carbon-neutral facility. It was done in line with the tenant’s ESG commitments to going carbon neutral as quickly as possible. Constructed in 2004, the original hall ran on gas heating and older lighting systems.

DHL approached CTP with its request to upgrade the warehouse in order to meet its carbon neutrality targets set for 2025–2030. They provided CTP with specific requirements, outlining the energy efficiency and carbon reduction goals they needed for their building. CTP installed heat pumps and upgraded the warehouse’s lighting and control systems, ensuring through a variety of studies that the project would attain maximum efficiency.

Michal Dospěl (CTP) says that project with DHL will serve as a pilot project in how to establish partnerships with other tenants with similar requirements. And he’s hopeful that the return on this type of investment will improve as such projects become more common. “As the demand for technology that we use to retrofit these buildings grows, the price will come down,” he says. “So, as time goes on, that investment in that equipment will be more economically interesting than it is today.”

The post From Gas to Green: Inside DHL’s Warehouse Upgrade with CTP first appeared on ThePrime.cz.

But that’s of course not what Larry intended. Fortunately for me and the planet, he was more referring to the misuse of the ESG acronym in connection with green washing. Larry is, and remains, a proponent of “conscientious capitalism.”

Last October, at the RICS Harris Debate, the central question was “Is it right to damage the economy to save the environment?” In their keynote address, Green Building Council CEO Smith Mordak challenged the UK government to overcome its fear of deficits to tackle the problem of sustainable development. Not surprisingly, their suggestion was swiftly brushed aside. With the clock ticking down on our climate doom, few agreed this as a good time to switch economic models. Transitioning away from fossil fuels will be expensive, so the global economy needs to be firing on all cylinders.

But the debate on how to get there is complicated. At the end of 2023, the United Nations Conference of the Parties 28 (COP 28) took place in the UAE with representation from 199 countries. Oil giant Adnoc’s chairperson Sultan al-Jaber was named president for the gathering, a decision activist Greta Thunberg described as “completely ridiculous.” Adnoc, after all, plans to double its oil output by 2030. On the other hand, al-Jaber is also chair of the state renewable energy company Masdar. Among the next steps mentioned in the conference’s concluding communique was to “transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems.” This was a compromise, since activists had demanded that COP 28 members would agree to “phase out fossil fuels.” But it’s a step in the right direction.

So is the EU Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), which came into play this year as of January 1. It requires companies to report on their ESG activities and track their carbon footprint. It is a phased approach, worth checking when you will be eligible to report so you can plan accordingly and be mindful the large companies are already required to report on their value chain. The European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) is the associated document that provides companies with a reporting framework to guide their reporting activities. The two documents are crammed with the sort of legalistic detail that could cure insomnia in less than three pages. Having gotten through the first fifty pages of each (and read the Big 4’s assessment for the rest), it is clear to me that compliance will take a Herculean effort. But changing directions to reach net-zero carbon emissions was never going to be easy.

With ongoing encouragement from Larry Fink, slow progress by the COP 28 and new EU directives, it seems the sustainable stars are starting to align. It is clear that the global economy needs to be working close to full power in order to drive the transition. Unfortunately, net zero remains a distant goal and there’s no silver bullet.

To get there navigating through a minefield of ESG risks and opportunities will force international bodies, countries, and companies of all sizes to develop complex strategies. The question now is: have you developed yours?

John Newton is a Prague-based ESG consultant supporting business, including construction and real estate companies

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The post John Newton: Sustainability’s stars are finally aligning first appeared on ThePrime.cz.

The European Union made carbon footprint reporting mandatory. The CSRD (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive) defines who needs to report and what the reporting should cover. Until now, that’s only been for the biggest companies — about 11,000 companies in the EU. From 2025, companies that employ over 250 people and generate over €50 million in revenues will also have to report. That means that by 2025, over 50,000 companies will have to send in their reports for 2024. After that, smaller business will join the reporting too. No official timeline was given yet.

How detailed is it?
Extremely detailed. Greenhouse Gas Emissions (the carbon footprint) is broken into 3 categories, or “scopes”. Scope 1 addresses your direct emissions from company owned facilities and vehicles. Scope 2 covers your company’s own electricity, heat and gas use, while Scope 3 covers all indirect emissions: it’s a wide look at impact of your business, which covers leased assets, waste production, transportation and distribution, business travel, and even employees commuting.

What sort of data do landlords need to be prepared to provide their tenants?
The number one issue for office buildings is energy, heat and gas consumption along with water consumption and waste production.  All those media need to be metered. Actually, one of the things that the Smart Score (a global certification for smart buildings) describes in a clever way is how to digitalize this data — how to organize it and deliver to occupiers. For example, when you do energy management you should really know how much energy your building is using by categories, such as heating, cooling and elevator systems. You should also know how much energy your tenants use just by plugging into the sockets. This data needs to be kept separate, because to improve things, you need to know the source of your consumption. Lots of building over-consume energy for cooling, but technology can help with that. If we add smart systems that help analyze people flow in the building, savings can reach 40%.

It’s 2024. We’ve had smart phones for a decade. BIM has existed for two decades. Why is digitization and data collection still so difficult for real estate?
Change takes time. And if you’re thinking about how many older buildings there are, in Poland only 25% of buildings are younger than 7 years. Anything older than that and the buildings are considered technically aging, because the BMS system probably isn’t ready for the ESG transformation and the building doesn’t really have smart meters and submeters. Additionally, there’s a high chance that the access control system isn’t ready for mobile credentials, Apple Wallet and all the things we need data from. It’s really time to start.

Many people are complaining that this push to sustainability is making the European Union uncompetitive and that enforcing these regulations isn’t feasible.
I really see the market as being divided into Innovators, Early Adapters, Early Majority, Late Majority and Laggards. It’s the technology adoption curve. The role of the innovators and early adapters is to set the right standards. Do you want to position yourself as leader? Or as a follower? The others will follow too and then, together we can finally have a positive impact on the planet.

How difficult will this be for older, historic buildings?
It’s not so simple, as every existing building is different, so knowledge and experience are needed. I think the market is still learning how to handle retrofits. Some buildings are in a better situation because not everything has to be replaced. Some can reuse the existing cabling, for example. You can add new meters, or keep the old ones but add smart additions to them. There’s a Scandinavian company that invented a meter that’s takes readings from old water meters and sends the data to the cloud. That means you don’t have to rebuild anything. But sometimes you need to pull all the guts out and do a full refurbishment. The European Union has calculated we need to refurbish 3% of buildings each year to achieve energy efficiency targets by 2050.

Ultimately, isn’t improving an existing building better from a carbon footprint standpoint more environmentally friendly than building a new, carbon neutral one?
Absolutely. Because most of the embedded carbon is in the concrete. So, let’s keep the concrete frame and put new solutions inside and maybe make the facade more efficient so it has better heat retention scores. But the structure should be kept if possible. Also, retrofit projects are way more fun because you’re working with some limitations, meaning you have to be more creative than if you’re building from scratch. There’s a wave of occupiers who appreciate retrofits more than new buildings, especially if they can use something that has a story.

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