Initiatives towards Carbon Neutrality in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area

Carbon neutrality represents one climate strategy adopted by many cities, including the city of Helsinki and the Helsinki metropolitan area in Finland. This study examines initiatives adopted by the Helsinki metropolitan area aimed at reducing energy-related carbon emissions and achieving carbon neutrality through future actions. Various sectorial energy consumption rates per year and carbon emissions from various sectors within the city of Helsinki and the metropolitan area were extracted from an online database and re-calculated (in GWh, MWh/inhabitant and MtCO(2)e, KtCO(2)e/inhabitant). We employed a backcasting scenario method to explore the various carbon reduction measures in the Helsinki metropolitan area. About 96% of the emissions produced in the Helsinki metropolitan area are energy-based. District heating represents the primary source of emissions, followed by transportation and electricity consumption, respectively. We also found that accomplishing the carbon reduction strategies of the Helsinki metropolitan area by 2050 remains challenging. Technological advancement for clean and renewable energy sources, smart policies and raising awareness resulting in behavioral changes greatly affect carbon reduction actions. Thus, strong political commitments are also required to formulate and implement stringent climate actionsPeer reviewe

The city of the future

In the face of the complexity of the interconnected processes involved in the relationships between cities and climate change this report researches the carbon-neutral city through a Bacchi-inspired governmentality lens, where the focus lies on how the physical structure and the technological choices are shaped and made in and through discursive problem representations. The field of carbon-neutral strategies lies in an intersection of physical and technological realities and an administration of social relations. Particular visions of the future are a momentary equilibrium of cultural, historical, and physical relations. Specific socio-technical choices are made as a result of underlying rationales, assumptions and conceptual premises in the strategies shape frame and the understood realm of possibilities for the imagined carbon neutral cities. It is this relation which I seek to scrutinise how the representation of the problem as global, together with premises of ‘future technology’, ‘compensation’ and the ‘limitless growing city’ lays the building block for the visualised futures and thus also for the inherently omitted and silenced elements. I conclude that the choiced trajectories of the Nordic cities towards practical initiatives for a carbon-neutral city are formed within the conjunction of historical, social and geographical situations and the conceptual world constructed by the international and national governed frame

Finland’s Integrated Energy and Climate Plan

Finland's Integrated Energy and Climate Plan contains Finland's national targets and the related policy measures to achieve the EU's 2030 energy and climate targets. The Energy and Climate Plan addresses all five dimensions of the EU Energy Union: decarbonisation, energy efficiency, energy security, internal energy markets and research, innovation and competitiveness. The EU has set Finland a 2030 national target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the non-emissions trading sector by 39 % compared to 2005. At the same time, emissions from the land-use sector should be kept lower than the computational reduction in emissions from sinks. Finland also aims to increase the share of renewable energy to at least 51 % of the final energy use and to 30 % of the final energy use in road transport. With regard to energy efficiency, the target is that the final energy consumption does not exceed 290 TWh. The Finnish Energy and Climate Plan outlines the impact of existing policy measures on the projected evolution of greenhouse gas emissions, renewable energy and energy efficiency up to 2040. In addition, the plan describes the effects of the planned policy measures on the energy system, greenhouse gas emissions and sinks, economic development, the environment and public health. The Plan also assesses the impact of planned and existing policy measures on investment

The Implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals in the Nordic Arctic (ISDeGoNA)

This report assesses the status of the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the Nordic Arctic. The 17 SDG’s can be seen as the most comprehensive international effort for sustainable development, however the process of implementing them in an Arctic context is still a research- and policy gap. In response, a comparative study has been carried out with a more specific focus on SDG implementation in Arctic Finland, Iceland, and Norway. Here, the research findings are based on small literature reviews and extensive semi-structured interviews with regional governments, local authorities, and business organizations. From this perspective, different contexts were thematized such as SDG awareness, most relevant SDGs within the focus areas, respective achievements and shortcomings, governance processes as well as essential stakeholders enabling SDG implementation.publishedVersio

The role of renewable energy policies for carbon neutrality in Helsinki Metropolitan area

Abstract Renewable energy policies are necessary for achieving carbon neutrality which is the main goal for climate change mitigation. The cities in the Helsinki Metropolitan area have committed themselves to significantly reducing carbon emissions through various climate measures including some measures for renewable energy utilization. We use multilevel perspective (MLP) and renewable energy frameworks to examine the role of renewable energy policies to carbon neutrality in the Helsinki Metropolitan area and base our analysis on various policy documents and semi-structured interviews. Our findings show that current renewable energy policies in the Helsinki Metropolitan area are weak and many challenges exist. Nevertheless, many options are available for improving existing policies. The cities have many opportunities to adopt various energy policy measures, including small-scale renewable energy production in building premises, renewable energy integration to district heating, demand-side solutions for energy utilization, and increasing budgets and subsidies to renewable energy production and enhancement of the social acceptance of renewable energy. Such additional policies are needed to reach carbon neutrality in the Helsinki Metropolitan area.Peer reviewe

Energy and security in transition - Insights and lessons from the Nordic region

This thesis explores how renewable energy sources can affect and thus potentially change the conceptualization of energy security through an empirical investigation of the Nordic region. To explore the energy security concept, energy and security of renewables in the Nordic countries is analysed by employing the wide framework designed by Bengt Johansson. The analysis reveals that renewable energy has various implications in the Nordic countries, of which some are similar, and some are distinct to certain countries. Going further, the renewable energy system is expected to be regional and many challenges related to the intermittent character of renewable energy sources can be solved by and through regional integration. The second stage of analysis therefore explores the compatibility between the Nordic regional vision of becoming a carbon-neutral region and the respective national strategies. Data from the Nordic Clean Energy Scenarios is compared with national renewable energy production plans towards 2040. The analysis shows that national strategies diverge from the NCES in different ways, and that the Nordic countries are currently not on track to reach the objective of carbon-neutrality by 2050. The thesis finds that these discrepancies can be attributed to mainly national priorities of self-sufficiency and security concerns, or internal debates and matters of public or political acceptance. Based on these two stages of analysis, the thesis concludes with five assumptions on what energy security in renewables can imply: it will be regional, liberalised and interdependent, it is contextual, and public acceptance plays a decisive role. These features can be both barriers and success factors for the realisation of the carbon-neutral Nordic region, and even for other regions to follow