Finnish and French cities chart Europe’s clean energy path

As Europe strives to become the first climate-neutral continent by 2050, Turku and Dijon are among a group of cities seeking to achieve this goal two decades ago.

In 2029, Finland’s oldest city, Turku, will celebrate 800 years old. At the same time, the city hopes to reach another major milestone—becoming climate neutral. The French city of Dijon, 2,000 kilometers away, hopes to achieve a similar goal by 2030.

Two is part of city ​​quest—an EU initiative to create 100 climate-neutral cities by the end of the decade. Turku and Dijon are also top members of REACT project to help cities chart the way forward clean energy.

city ​​lab

“We are finding new ways to empower different types of citizens,” said David Goujon, project coordinator.

Three-quarters of EU residents live in urban areas. Worldwide, cities occupy more than 65% of global energy consumption and more than 70% of greenhouse gas emissions—making them key players in the fight against global warming.

A wide range of green technologies have been developed, from solar panels to quadruple glazing, but choosing the best combination to meet the specific needs of each city is no easy task.

RESPONSE has laid out nearly 100 options from which cities can choose a combination that works best for their particular situations. Examples include biomethane produced from sewage sludge, predictive home thermostats, and high-performance ventilation systems.

The project is also running workshops and hackathons to introduce residents to existing energy-saving tools, encouraging them to use less and reduce their bills.

A variety of options will be tested in Turku and Dijon, the project’s two “lighthouse cities”. Six allied cities—Brussels (Belgium), Zaragoza (Spain), Botoșani (Romania), Ptolemy (Greece), Gabrovo (Bulgaria) and Severodonetsk (Ukraine)—will seek to apply what they learn.

One major goal is to create “energy-positive districts” in these cities—meaning that they produce more energy than they consume. The ultimate goal is to produce 20% more energy than is consumed annually, but to achieve a positive balance at a minimum.

local difference

According to Goujon, sustainable cities project manager at the European Institute for Energy Research (EIFER) in Karlsruhe, Germany, the idea is to cover a range of cities with different characteristics and at different stages. on the path to sustainable development to test what works for different populations. .

The focus in Turku is on its large student population—with the city having many universities and about 40,000 undergraduate students. The focus Dijon is comprised of many low-income households with a diverse cultural mix of nationalities.

“Those are two completely different worlds that we are dealing with,” says Goujon.

RESPONSE hopes that Turku and Dijon can inspire other European cities to follow and replicate their examples.

“We can advise the European Commission that some of these solutions are perfect in Dijon’s terms, others are very good in Turku’s terms, and then the member cities can learn ask from this,” said Monjur Murshed, coordinator of RESPONSE. and senior project manager for climate-neutral communities at EIFER.

Over the past six months, RESPONSE has carried out activities including refurbishing buildings in Dijon and Turku, as well as installing quad-glazed windows and solar technology.

In both cities, the team is testing community-based options for creating recycled energy. In one district of Dijon, for example, 1,100 residents will participate in a solar-harvesting initiative in the second half of 2023. Smart public lighting and infrastructure for electric vehicles, as well as systems cloud-based smart energy systems, are other options under consideration in the two cities.

What works best will become clearer next year. Goujon and Murshed suggest that the project’s positive energy goals can be achieved by 2024.

Buy green

A project called XPRESS sought to increase city planners’ uptake of renewable energy (RES) solutions by bringing together small and medium enterprises (SMEs), public authorities and end users of technology.

The tools developed include a Searchable database with bidding packages related to RES and green public procurement projects in 10 European countries—Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Norway, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom Older brother

The database aims to make it easier for SMEs to access RES packages and, by extension, increase the adoption of innovative solutions by cities—leading to significant energy savings and reduce carbon emissions.

XPRESS has tried to encourage public authorities to consider the full long-term environmental impact of products over their entire life cycle rather than just their initial price.

“The goal was to get the authorities to write public bids taking into account the real impact,” said project coordinator Riccardo Coletta of the Agency for the Promotion of European Research (APRE) in Rome, Italy. on the environment in purchasing costs”. “You can’t just consider the price you’ll pay for a new service, energy or car for your public transit fleet.”

Coletta highlights advances in electric transport in the Portuguese city of Braga, where he says there is a strong commitment to promoting green transport through the development of all-electric buses. , promote tram and build charging stations.

The Danish island of Samsø, home to 4,000 residents, is another notable case. In 2007, it became the first island in the world to be powered entirely by renewable energy. Community involvement is key to the island’s rapid progress.

According to Coletta, larger areas could build on these examples.

“One way could be to start producing renewable energy with small communities, and then sell the energy to other communities that might draw inspiration from this example,” he said. “This means a bottom-up change coming from the people.”