Turku connects circularity to climate neutrality using new roadmap

The Circular Turku roadmap will help the Finnish city achieve resource wisdom by 2040

For many years, the Finnish City of Turku has worked hard to prove its commitment to becoming a greener and more sustainable city. Taking a case in point, it has set itself the ambitious goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2029 and climate positive from then onwards. Now, it has taken a step further, launching its Circular Turku roadmap and illustrating how it will achieve a resource wise future with zero emissions by 2040.

To create this roadmap, the Finnish city collaborated with more than 200 local and regional stakeholders to define the circular economy interventions that it has included. In addition to this, ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability and the Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra have also supported the preparation of the roadmap.

Connecting circularity to climate neutrality

According to ICLEI, Turku is the first city to establish a link between circularity and climate neutrality. Expanding on this, the Finnish city aims to use its roadmap to minimise indirect and consumption-based emissions; that is, emissions that are the result of local activities and consumption which occur elsewhere. Commenting on these goals, Mayor Minna Arve shared:

“Through Circular Turku, the city of Turku is hoping to create the enabling conditions for circular production and consumption systems that minimise emissions, resource extraction and waste all along the value chains […] The circular economy represents a unique opportunity to address emissions systematically, in line with net zero targets, while still contributing to a vibrant local economy such as the one we have in Turku.”

Five key areas

The Circular Turku roadmap is reportedly based on the circular economy approach and methods of ICLEI, among other leading organisations. As such, it uses ICLEI’s Circular City Actions Framework, which consists of five strategies: Rethink, Regenerate, Reduce, Reuse, and Recover.

With this model, the Finnish city hopes to transition from a linear to a circular economy. Taking this further, it will use the framework to target five key areas: Energy systems, Food value chains, Water cycles, Transport and logistics, and Buildings and Construction.

Finally, it is important to note that the roadmap is the first of its kind, including a social risk assessment and considering social equity.

To view the roadmap, visit ICLEI’s website here.