Helsinki, capital of Finland, aims for climate neutral by 2030, which will entail reducing carbon emissions by 80% from 1990 levels. Already having achieved a 25% reduction by 2022, the city is seeking further reductions through the energy consumption of buildings, which accounts for 60% of the city's total emissions. Helsinki’s 'Energy Renaissance' launched as part of the EU-funded MySmartLife project, seeks to empower locals to combat these emissions.
The Energy Renaissance
Energy Renaissance kicked off in 2021. The city established a team of energy specialists providing free, impartial advice to housing companies, promoting energy-efficient renovations.
Following a request from the housing companies, which are run by residents, the team provides technical support. In Finland, privately owned apartments form a ‘housing company.’ Decisions about renovations are made by the apartment owners, who are shareholders in the company. They often lack special competence and therefore impartial expertise provided by the city can help them make the right decisions.
The support provided can take different forms. The simplest set of recommendations the team can give starts with studying the building and suggesting improvements. If approved by the housing companies, the experts can make more detailed recommendations. Some of these may entail changing the energy source of the buildings to also promote the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in the city.
By the end of 2023, the initiative had engaged over 600 housing companies. Among these, geothermal heat, exhaust air heat recovery, electric car charging, and smaller energy efficiency measures were among the top subjects enquired about. The majority of the housing companies contacting the service were at the very beginning of their energy efficiency journey.
What were the key drivers for the initiative?
- Economic: Increased awareness and incentives for energy-efficient renovations due to rising energy costs.
- Social: Improved living conditions and reduced energy bills heighten property values and social equity.
- Technical: the Finnish housing company model means that decisions about renovations are made together by the apartment owners.
- Legal: he city’s own stringent climate targets as well as national climate and energy policies guide the decarbonisation efforts.
And what were the challenges and barriers?
- Political: Changes in national energy policies and local governance impact strategy implementation.
- Social: Less economically advantaged areas, where people could benefit most from renovations, are slower to reach out and engage with these services.
Potential for replication
Helsinki’s Energy Renaissance model is a straightforward approach to empowering residents to contribute to local emissions goals while improving their own lives. The model could be replicated or adapted in other cities, especially those where Finnish housing-company-style organisations are prevalent. This Finnish housing-company-style stems from the fact that the local government owns a big part of the land of the territory. This entails that the multi-story buildings in the city are owned by a reduced amount of people which, in turn, makes it easier to reach out to them to promote the renovation of their properties.
It is also worth noting that a high level of trust in the public sector in Helsinki is an enabling condition that may be present to a lesser or greater degree in other cities.
A substantial investment is required, however. Energy Renaissance has a budget of €800 000 per year. Of this, €650,000 is spent on wages for employees and €150,000 on services, including awareness raising trough communication campaigns.
Lessons learned and recommendations
Having the city as a non-biased intermediary between residents and suppliers ensures that clear information is available and increases the confidence of housing companies in the energy advice and solutions.
The importance of awareness raising is also a major learning point for the initiative. Simply providing such a service has little benefit if people are not aware of it, and it requires at least two years for an initiative like this to pick up momentum. Helsinki found the use of mass media, public in-person and online events, and site visits to successfully renovated buildings to be essential tools in popularising the Energy Renaissance.
A final takeaway from Helsinki’s experience is the importance of a customer-focused approach. Implementation of such an approach can include speaking the residents’ language, rather than straying into technical jargon, and remaining flexible in your approach.