With a fossil fuel-free approach that incorporates public transportation, district heating, cooling, and electricity, the Skne region moves quickly toward its long-term climate targets.
Cities in the Skne region of southern Sweden, including Malmö and Lund, have pledged to do away with fossil fuels and cut CO2 emissions across a range of municipal services.
Polluting fuels like gasoline, oil, coal, and natural gas have been reduced in use thanks to the manufacture of biogas and the usage of wind energy, according to Magnus Lund, a Kristianstad-based climate strategist: “We have to share good ideas. To address all of our significant environmental problems, we must share them publicly.
Transportation decarbonization has been a primary goal. The municipality of Lund has created a ground-breaking business travel system among other projects.
A fleet of eco-friendly automobiles are now available to city employees via a booking system. The platform gives commuters automobiles that run on biogas and electricity according to their needs and the distance to be traveled, but more importantly, it offers bicycles.
According to Elin Dalaryd, a climate strategist from Lund, “the idea of this system is to both optimize the vehicle fleet so that we can use the cars and the bicycles more efficiently and to steer people’s behavior towards walking, biking, and using public transportation before they choose the car.”
Participating in the project are seven cities in the area. The project coordinator claims that green energy strategies have already been implemented in building, heating, and transportation.
“Fossil fuel-free municipalities in Skne 2.0” project manager Johannes Elamzon remarked, “We are now 98% fossil free in our seven municipalities and we have cut greenhouse gas emissions by 73% in seven years. It is a great result.”
Nearly €1.6 million overall will be spent on the project, with €500,000 coming from the European Cohesion Policy. In the initiative, 53,000 municipal employees are involved.
In a different project, biofuel is being made using a truck that collects trash.
One of the first biogas plants in Sweden is located in Kristianstad, where the organic waste is processed. The municipality owns the facility, which has been in operation for more than 20 years.
“We have the ability to recycle the energy you use. Tore Sigurdsson, a biogas plant manager for utility firm C4 Energi, stated that it may be used for buses and automobiles in the municipality as well as the nutrients in the material, which we can take out to the fields and then fertilize for fresh crops.
Biofuel is used for the majority of the biogas. A portion is also employed in heating. The local ecology is very well adapted to this circular system.
“Our town has a lot of agricultural land and food industry, so we had an issue with a lot of organic waste. As with other inventions where we began with a problem and came up with a decent solution, we eventually recognized that we could use it as a source of clean energy, continued Lund.