Fossil-Free Sweden and Viable Cities are today joining forces to work together to ensure that public procurement drives demand for fossil-free and climate-neutral solutions in the construction and civil engineering sector. Emissions from new construction can already be cut in half today, but demand for these new solutions must increase.
At the Viable Cities Transition Lab Forum in Eskilstuna on March 25, Svante Axelsson from Fossil-Free Sweden and Olga Kordas from Viable Cities met to expand their joint efforts toward climate transition in cities.
“It is high time to move from goals and strategies to large-scale implementation in order to achieve our climate targets. Climate-smart solutions already exist in the construction and civil engineering sectors, and by pooling the strengths of many cities, we have everything we need to develop the market and boost the competitiveness of companies in Sweden,” says Olga Kordas, Program Director at Viable Cities.
– We look forward to strengthening our partnership with Fossil-Free Sweden to significantly accelerate the transition to climate-smart construction and civil engineering.
Fossil-Free Sweden has successfully mobilized many industries around the transition to a fossil-free welfare society, and within Viable Cities, 48 cities in Sweden are mobilizing to accelerate the climate transition. Now, the two organizations are strengthening their collaboration to more clearly link the cities’ ambitious climate goals with the implementation of roadmaps in the building and construction sector, which have been developed within the framework of Fossil-Free Sweden. The goal is for the climate transition to serve as a driving force for enhanced competitiveness in the business sector.
– Today, the industry is ready with climate-smart solutions that we couldn’t have imagined ten years ago. A long list of construction projects shows that it’s possible to build new structures with half the climate impact, without it having to cost more. Now we need to boost demand for these solutions, and cities play a key role in this through public procurement. “Halving the impact should become the new normal,” says Svante Axelsson, national coordinator at Fossil-Free Sweden.
The construction and civil engineering sector accounts for about one-fifth of Sweden’s carbon footprint, and the goal of this agreement is to use procurement as a powerful tool to drive demand for fossil-free and climate-neutral solutions within the industry. Fossil-Free Sweden and Viable Cities have previously issued a joint call for the procurement of zero-emission construction equipment; now, the collaboration is being expanded to encompass the entire construction and civil engineering process.
The agreement was part of the program for the Transition Lab Forum 20 in Eskilstuna, which focuses on the business community’s involvement in cities’ climate transition. The event brought together representatives from the 48 cities participating in Viable Cities’ “Climate-Neutral Cities 2030” initiative, as well as Eskilstuna’s local coalition, Klimatevolution.
