Category News

Smart City Expo World Congress

Smart City Expo World Congress (Barcelona, November 15-17) is the leading international event for the smart city sector, a key meeting point for experts and leaders of the world's most innovative cities, companies, research centers and international organizations. Over 24,000 professionals are expected from more than 700 cities and over 400 international speakers that will share their vision on how to build a more sustainable and livable urban future.

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Evolving dialogue on climate change in Götepod

In all 23 cities that are part of Viable Cities' Climate Neutral Cities 2030 program, intensive work is underway with citizen engagement where they experiment with different forms. For more than a year now, Gothenburg has hosted Götepod, where city architect Björn Siesjö talks to guests about Gothenburg's urban development from different perspectives. In episode 18, he was visited by Karin Bjerner, Development Manager at the Environmental Administration, City of Gothenburg and Viable Cities Learning Strategist Lena Holmberg.

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Gothenburg's climate transition from a geopolitical perspective

Carl Mossfeldt, who heads Gothenburg's climate transition function, used Karin Boye's poem Ja visst gör det ont in his opening speech at Lindholmen Open Day to illustrate the situation in which Gothenburg and many other cities find themselves in terms of daring to let go of the old. In his speech, he also emphasized the importance of seeing the climate transition in a geopolitical perspective ...

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Viable Cities Climate Breakfast

Climate Breakfast 25: Leadership and capacity building for climate neutral cities 2030

The transition to become climate neutral 2030 requires that cities work in new ways. In this climate breakfast we explore how the cities of Valencia and Stockholm have handled this challenge in terms of leadership, organization and capacity building. We also learn more about new tools such as portfolio management and the role of intermediary organizations such as citiES 2030 in Spain and Viable Cities in Sweden, for supporting this development.

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Viable Cities System Demonstrator

Developing and testing new innovation methods for complex societal challenges

The development of so-called system demonstrators is a way to enable system innovation with great power and mobilization to meet complex societal challenges. With system demonstrators, Vinnova and Viable Cities want to test and demonstrate the transformation of a system in a real environment, where space is created for experiments and where areas with great potential can be scaled up. Six projects have been granted funding for a design phase.

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Viable Cities participates at SCEWC

Smart City Expo World Congress (Barcelona, November 15-17) is the leading international event for the smart city sector, a key meeting point for experts and leaders of the world's most innovative cities, companies, research centers and international organizations. Over 24,000 professionals are expected from more than 700 cities and over 400 international speakers that will share their vision on how to build a more sustainable and livable urban future.

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Viable Cities System Demonstrator

System demonstrators for faster climate transition in cities

In response to the climate crisis, the world's cities must make a huge transition. The whole notion of urban life and how we travel, eat, shop, work, build and heat homes must change to address climate change. This requires a systemic shift that involves new innovative approaches and solutions that include multiple dimensions such as policy and regulation, business models, behavior and infrastructure. Thus, a new form of intervention, called system demonstrator, has been developed by Vinnova and Viable Cities as a way to enable system innovation to meet complex societal challenges with great power and mobilization. Read more on Vinnova's website.

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Climate breakfast in general

Climate Breakfast 23: Seven Swedish cities in the EU Cities Mission - what does it mean?

Gävle, Gothenburg, Helsingborg, Lund, Malmö, Stockholm and Umeå. It is now clear which Swedish municipalities will now be part of the EU's mission for climate-neutral cities in 2030 - Cities Mission. A total of 100 cities across Europe have been selected. But what does this mean for the cities that joined? And how can it contribute to the climate transition in all Swedish cities?

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How can cities reduce emissions by 20% this year?

Already this year, emissions in Sweden need to be reduced by more than 20 percent to meet our share of the Paris Agreement's 1.5 degree target. This is according to a carbon budget developed by WWF together with researchers at Uppsala University. Meeting the target requires a completely different societal transition than the one currently being discussed in the Swedish debate. So how can cities accelerate their climate work and help to speed up the climate transition? Lars Johansson explains more about this in his blog.

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Seven Swedish municipalities in the EU's major initiative for 100 climate-neutral cities by 2030

Gävle, Gothenburg, Helsingborg, Lund, Malmö, Stockholm and Umeå. These are the Swedish municipalities that are now part of the EU's mission for climate-neutral cities in 2030 - Cities Mission. A total of 100 cities have been selected out of 377 applicants. And seven of them are Swedish cities.

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External call for proposals from Formas: Climate neutral and inclusive municipalities

The societal challenges we face relate not only to climate change but also to housing segregation, exclusion and health inequalities. With less than 10 years to go before the 2030 Agenda goals are achieved, the time to act is now. It's time to turn knowledge into action and ensure that research is put to good use in order to transition to a sustainable society that does not exceed the planetary boundaries.

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Climate Breakfast 22: Events as the engine of the climate transition

Events are a growing billion-dollar industry and a key component of the economy and profile of many cities. At the same time, they are an increasingly important tool for community development. The joy and excitement of an event is something special. There is a strength and power to influence and change. This is why events have a great potential to contribute to, push and accelerate the climate transition.

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Vinnova and Viable Cities in design phase for system demonstrators

Achieving the mission of climate-neutral cities by 2030 requires a transformation of the entire social system. We need to work in completely new ways and find solutions that encompass all dimensions that affect our lives: from regulatory frameworks and business models to the behavior of all citizens.
Vinnova, Viable Cities and several cities are now developing a new tool to achieve this - system demonstrators. Anna Gemzell from Umeå municipality believes the tool can make a difference.

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Mini meeting in Borlänge paid big dividends 

Gävle, Borlänge and Eskilstuna are three of the "newer" municipalities in the Climate Neutral Cities 2030 initiative. This week, the project managers from the three met at the Palladium in Borlänge for joint learning.
- "There is great value in developing existing and finding new forms of cooperation between the cities when climate work is accelerated," says Evelina Loberg, project manager in Gävle municipality.

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Climate Breakfast 21: From the EU to Karlstad - circular economy for climate-neutral cities

Nature is a good example of a circular system, nothing becomes trash that needs to be disposed of, everything is recreated into something new. To keep the global temperature rise below 1.5 degrees, we need to find circular systems for the resources we use. During Climate Breakfast 21, we went from broad brushstrokes in the EU to local initiatives in Karlstad. How can the circular economy contribute more to the climate transition?

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Transition Lab Forum 8: Climate mobilization at all levels

During Transition Lab Forum 8, we shared experiences from Skellefteå as part of the transition in northern Sweden, and we explored some key issues in the transition process and Climate City Contract 2030 - multi-level governance, sustainable construction, business strategies for sustainability and citizen engagement. The power of the transition in the north is a golden opportunity to use to accelerate the climate transition throughout Sweden and the world.

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Climate breakfast in general

Climate Breakfast 20: Building with wood - sustainable and strong!

Many of the emissions we need to address come from construction, including the materials used, such as concrete. But it is possible to use other materials, the forest contributes a material that is both strong and sustainable. Sustainable construction in wood is the theme of Climate Breakfast 20, where we are hosted by Tomas Nord from RISE / Smart Housing Småland and Britt-Inger Brisádottir, development strategist, Gustaf Ulander, project manager, both from Skellefteå municipality.

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Climate breakfast in general

Climate Breakfast 19: A deep dive into Climate City Contract 2030

This breakfast is hosted by our program manager Olga Kordas, who develops the thoughts about Climate City Contract 2030's innermost essence, and by Henrik Johansson from Växjö municipality and Charlotte Brynielsson from Kalmar municipality. Both municipalities are part of the Climate Neutral Cities 2030 initiative and will talk about the value of Climate City Contract, the iterative process, what they have achieved and their plans for the future. Welcome to the Viable Cities Climate Breakfast 2022!

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Call #10 open: Solutions for sustainable mobility in European-Chinese cooperation program.

Do you want to contribute to the development of sustainable urban mobility? Now you can apply for support for Swedish participation in the call for proposals within the European-Chinese cooperation program ERA-Net Cofund Urban Accessibility and Connectivity Sino-European. The Swedish Energy Agency and Vinnova with Viable Cities and Drive Sweden together announce about SEK 9 million to Swedish actors.

Read moreCall #10 open: Solutions for sustainable mobility in European-Chinese cooperation program.

9 Swedish organizations finalists in the Climate Smart Cities Challenge

From nearly 200 entrants, 45 innovative companies from around the world have now been selected to tackle climate challenges in four cities. All entries were reviewed by experts, representatives from the four cities and Climate Smart Cities Challenge partners, including Viable Cities and UN-Habitat. Nine of the finalists are from Sweden.

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European Viable Cities Day 2021

Climate City Contract 2030 is revised every year, evolving and sharpening every year to accelerate the transition to climate-neutral, sustainable cities. The first version was signed in December 2020 by nine cities, four government agencies and the Viable Cities program. On 8 December...

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Swedish cities and government agencies inspire climate change in Europe

23 cities and five government agencies are now working with Climate City Contract 2030 as a tool to achieve the mission - climate neutral and sustainable cities by 2030. During the European Viable Cities Day 2021, the work was manifested with a signing ceremony. European guests and representatives from all 23 cities and five government agencies shared how we can accelerate the climate transition together.

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Blog: City of Stockholm - From chance to structure

Since October, 23 cities have been working together in the Climate Neutral Cities 2030 initiative to accelerate the climate transition. The nine cities that have been involved since the start in 2019 are now sharing their most important experiences in a series of blog posts. This time it is about the City of Stockholm, which is working to implement pilot and demonstration projects on a larger scale, and sees that Climate City Contract 2030 strengthens the work for a sustainable climate-neutral society.

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Climate breakfast 18: Equal children play best - Nordic collaboration for accelerated climate action

For two years, Viable Cities has, through the Nordic Transition Partnership project, supported Nordic collaboration between small and medium-sized cities to accelerate climate work with a special focus on the circular economy. In this Climate Breakfast, we were welcomed by Ulrika Holmgren from Smart Innovation Norway who leads the project, as well as Pelle Hallberg from Gästrike återvinnare in Gävle and Elisabet Farner from Kristianstad municipality with long experience of Nordic collaboration who share challenges and success factors.

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