Commercial Properties Installing Electric-Vehicle Charging Stations
SAINT JOHN – Commercial Properties, one of the region’s largest property owners and managers, is installing electric-vehicle charging stations for use by its tenants, the company announced Tuesday.
“We think it’s the right thing to do,” said general manager Paul Moore in a phone interview. “We had conversations with our tenants and decided to make it another amenity.”
The company will first install stations at the Mercantile Centre and Chesley Drive buildings in Saint John.
Commercial Properties owns several other buildings in Saint John, including Brunswick House, Somerset Square, CenterBeam Place, the Red Rose Building and the Ordnance Building. It also owns Commerce Place, a six-story building on Main Street in Moncton. The plan is to eventually have charging stations at all of its major buildings.
Moore said not many tenants currently drive electric vehicles, but that this could help them make the switch.
“From surveys we’ve done in the buildings we manage, we know that over 80 percent of our tenants drive themselves to work, and another 10 percent carpool, so there is a real opportunity for energy savings and emission reductions by helping them switch to Electric Vehicles,” said Moore.
Commercial Properties is also adding a new Chevy Bolt EV to its fleet of vehicles.
The company prides itself on environmental responsibility. It was the first private company to build a LEED Gold certified building in Atlantic Canada and currently has eight buildings certified under the BOMA BEST program, which measures and grades energy and water usage in an effort to reduce resource consumption.
It has further reduced energy consumption and its overall carbon footprint by installing modern high-efficiency HVAC heating and cooling equipment, LED lighting and sensors. It was also the first business in Saint John to use solar-powered compacting trash bins.