Mundus Nordic Green News – 25 January, 2021

Sweden set to use its share of the EU’s Corona Fund for green transition

The European Commission will receive reports from Member States plan to use the money in the Covid-19 support package in April. “The focus for the Swedish plan will be the green transition, increased digitisation and educational investments,” said Minister for Finance Magdalena Andersson. At least 37% of EU support must go towards measures intended to improve the climate efforts, with 20% being earmarked for digitisation.

 

Meanwhile, Finland’s government, which has extremely aggressive climate goals, has received a poor assessment for its plans. According to ETLA, an independent thinktank, Finland’s plan for usage of the funds in its Sustainable Growth Programme – is mistakenly focused on short-term growth by focusing on the recovery and profitability of the private sector as well as public services. While the Programme claims to revolve around large and impactful sets of goals, in reality its investment targets are too numerous and overly scattered, negating its impact. ETLA points out that the fund allocation ought to be based on goals that will create value for the EU as a whole.

 

Finland’s Neste ranked as the world's fourth most sustainable company

Neste, a Finnish oil refiner, has taken fourth place on the Corporate Knights Global 100 list of the world's most sustainable companies. The company has been on the Global 100 list for 15 years in a row. Neste has had a place on the list for a longer uninterrupted period of time than any other energy company.

 

Gasum aims to reduce carbon emissions by 1 Mt by increasing the availability of biogas

Gasum is a Finnish state-owned company which supplies natural and biogas, heat and power in the Nordics. The company announced that it is continuing its work towards carbon neutrality by setting new environmental goals to counteract climate change. The company wants to increase the availability of biogas to achieve an overall reduction in carbon emissions of one million tonnes. By 2025, Gasum expects to make 4 TWh of biogas available on the market, from the company's own production and from certified European partners. The company will reduce emissions in its own production chains for liquefied natural gas (LNG) and biogas and will intensify its energy efficiency measures in its own operations. Gasum plans to increase the production capacity and availability of biogas by building new plants and increasing the purchases of biogas from other operators' production plants. Gasum currently has 9 biogas plants in Finland and 6 in Sweden.

 

Rockwool converts its production to biogas

Denmark’s Rockwool is a maker of stone-based insulation. Until now, its energy-intensive production has made it one of Denmark's largest CO2 emitters. But, from January it has just taken a significant step towards a greener future, with the largest smelters at the company's two Danish factories producing using CO2-neutral biogas. Rockwool will reach over 70% CO2 reduction in 2021 (compared to 1990), delivering its share of Denmark's common climate goals well before 2030.

 

Frank Larsen, CEO of ROCKWOOL Nordics said “We are proud that we make a contribution to reducing CO2 emissions from industry. This is not just an important step for us, but for the entire sector, because it shows that it is realistic to convert industrial processes with very high temperatures to renewable energy and thereby reduce CO2 emissions.”

 

Azelio and Svea Solar sign LoI for joint projects with energy storage and solar cells

Azelio and Svea Solar have signed a letter of intent to jointly develop projects with Azelio's energy storage, TES.POD, connected to solar cells. The collaboration will extend over at least 3 projects in 2021, 5 projects in 2022 and 10 projects in 2023. A total of 8 MW of installed power and more than 100 MWh in storage capacity.

 

Svea Solar is Sweden's largest installer of solar cells. As part of expanding its offering to the energy storage segment in Sweden in particular and Europe in general, a collaboration is initiated with Azelio, which develops energy storage for round-the-clock equalization. Azelio's energy storage, TES.POD, stores renewable energy as heat in recycled aluminum. The system then produces electricity and heat on demand, during the dark hours of the day and when direct production is not sufficient.

  

Arket starts clothing rental service

This week, H&M’s brand, Arket will start its new children clothing rental service in cooperation with the Dutch company, Circos. According to Circos, the clothes are used by between 8 and 10 families before the garment is ready for recycling. Arket CEO Pernilla Wohlfart said in the press release, "We are happy to give our customers the opportunity to share our clothes with other families. We are also proud to become a part of Circos and their vision for a more circular economy." Circos already has several high profile partnerships to their rental services, such as Adidas and Patagonia. Their new Arket-service will be available all over Europe, starting at €19.5 a month.

 

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