A multitude of networks and partnerships in Västra Götaland

Region Västra Götaland

The climate issue is a huge challenge, but also a business opportunity for small and large entrepreneurs. Västra Götaland has most of Sweden’s engineering, environmental and consumer research, successful companies in the energy and climate fields, industrial expertise, natural resources and skilled, environment-conscious people. Over 40% of Swedish environmental research comes from this region.

Västra Götaland has Sweden’s best biogas infrastructure with almost 50 filling stations and 10,000 vehicles

Public and private stakeholders together decide on more concrete measures and agreements and take responsibility for their implementation. For example, one of Region Västra Götaland’s environmental objectives is to be independent of fossil energy by 2030. Through the Smart Energy dialogue, Region Västra Götaland and the 49 municipalities have defined the challenges and determined what agreements are needed to make things happen. The dialogue has comprised six different focus areas, involving over 600 people from municipalities, trade and industry, higher education institutions and organisations. A regional climate strategy was adopted in autumn 2009 and four major agreements between stakeholders were launched. Several more will follow. The aim is to reduce climate effects while creating growth and jobs.

Think local, lead global

Västra Götaland is well advanced in the biogas (biomethane) field, an almost climate-neutral high-grade fuel extracted from biological waste. Biogas Väst is a collaborative project to promote biogas as vehicle fuel, with some 30 actors collaborating in the biogas chain in the region – fuel producers, municipalities, vehicle manufacturers and distributors. This public-private partnership has inspired biogas partnerships globally.

Hamnhuset block of flats built by Älvstranden development in Göteborg, is the largest passive house in Sweden. It has a heat exchange system, but no radiators. The building is impermeable and very well-insulated. It is heated mainly by body heat, household appliances and the sun, which is used for heating tap water and the building. Only during the coldest winter weeks will complementary district heating be used

Solid biofuels made from forest industry waste are a growth area and another way of capitalising on the area’s natural resources.

Universities and research institutes conduct research and contribute in the development of energy engineering and many companies specialise in biofuel-related equipment.

Numerous companies in west Sweden supply the wind power industry, among them SKF, the world leader in ball bearings for wind power plants. Wind power generation in Västra Götaland is set to increase 25-fold by 2020 – from today’s 0.2 TWh to 5 TWh.

The regional network, Power Väst, promotes development of wind power in west Sweden, primarily in industry, new set-ups, and education. It is a reference group for the Power Cluster European Union project and other wind projects in west Sweden. Taking part are Region Västra Götaland, the Swedish Government’s wind power coordinator for southern Sweden, Business Region Göteborg, Göteborg Energi, Chalmers University of Technology, SSPA Sweden AB, and the Öckerö municipality.

The Soluppgång i Väst project provides information about solar energy and how citizens, companies and authorities can choose the best system to invest in. It is backed by Region Västra Götaland, some twenty municipalities in west Sweden, the Swedish Solar Energy industry association, Hållbar utveckling Väst and the Västra Götaland county administrative board.

Outside the town of Lysekil, systems are being developed for extracting energy from ocean waves and plans exist for a wave energy park.

Pioneers in hydrogen

Hydrogen gas and fuel cells are another area of development. ETC Battery and FuelCells, based in the municipality of Ale and jointly owned by industry, universities and municipalities, is an energy engineering centre to develop advanced batteries and fuel cells. Region Västra Götaland has launched Hydrogen Sweden, a nationwide network to promote hydrogen to industry, education institutions and the public sector.

The aim of the Scandinavian Hydrogen Highway Partnership (SHHP) is to make the Scandinavian region one of the first in Europe where hydrogen is available and used as vehicle fuel. SHHP is a transnational networking platform that catalyses and coordinates collaboration between three national networking bodies, HyNor (Norway), Hydrogen Link (Denmark) and Hydrogen Sweden. The collaboration includes regional clusters of major and small industries, research institutions and local/regional authorities.

Heated by human warmth

Energy-efficient building, including passive houses (new and renovations), is another environmental specialty of west Sweden and an important instrument for reducing climatic impact. Passive houses are particularly well-insulated houses with efficient heat recovery from exhaust air. They are heated by body heat and excess heat from lights and household appliances. The Passive House Centre in the town of Alingsås is a regional resource for energy-efficient building.

The Region’s international commitments include Build with CaRe (carbon reduction), a European partnership partly funded by the Interreg IVB North Sea Region Programme. The Build with CaRe partnership mobilises all available know-how about energy-efficient buildings and engages in marketing, publicity, education, planning, policy and research to make energy-efficient building design the mainstream.

A number of environmental companies with advisory or consultancy services, environmental expertise and energy engineering and technology have joined together in the Ecoex growth project. The project helps environmental companies in west Sweden break into export markets. It is estimated that it has so far contributed to export business of around GB£6 million. Several of the companies involved also say their participation in the project will lead to export business within one or two years.

Region Västra Götaland
W: www.vgregion.se/miljo