As a Circular Cities and Regions Initiative (CCRI) Pilot region with a large construction industry, Tampere has a high potential for implementing circular systemic solutions. Since receiving tailored support from CCRI circular economy experts, Tampere region has developed SÄILÖ projects to reclaim used building materials and cooperated with the ECO3 industrial circular economy area to help public and private organisations collaborate better, all with the aim of lowering CO2 emissions and reducing construction waste through circular resource reclamation.

The challenge: new construction creates pollution and waste 

In the EU, buildings already account for nearly half of total energy consumption, over one third of GHG emissions, half of all extracted materials, and over a third of waste generation. The construction industry alone is responsible for 30% of all CO2 emissions in Finland, presenting the need to bring emissions down and resource efficiency up. 

ECO3’s circular economy area 

Rising to meet this challenge, the ECO3 area operates as a circular economy industrial park in the city of Nokia, Tampere region, with the aim of creating a more resilient circular economy for the territory. ECO3 has made remarkable progress and is now recognised as a key player in advancing circular and bio-economy initiatives on a national scale. 

A total of 40 organisations, mainly companies, have sparked EUR 80 m of investment in ECO3’s circular economy area, which aims to foster bio-economy and circular economy products in the market by allowing local organisations to share resources easily. This means operators do not need to invest in costly, polluting trucks for transportation over long distances, instead buying from their neighbouring organisations. In this way, ECO3 boosts the local circular economy, valorises local resources and makes the territory more resilient to any global supply chain issues. 

Verte Ltd. has run the ECO3 project for ten years within Tampere region, Finland’s second largest economic area. The company aims to promote more cooperative activities and expand the area to consider the needs of both heavy industry and industrial production critical infrastructure. 

As Verte CEO Sakari Ermala explains, “we aim to promote the market for bio-economy and circular economy products and services through public procurement.” He also highlighted the key tasks of the platform company are to enable the bio-economy, develop the circular economy and accelerate the green transition. 

ECO3 also helps local public authorities to cooperate with companies, as the public sector is frequently a customer of infrastructure construction companies in the region. Their collaboration also gives the public sector a deeper understanding of the daily operations of companies in the circular and bio-economy, demonstrating how well the public and private sectors can work together through a publicly-owned platform company. 

Tampere region is now Finland’s second largest economic area, and ECO3 has helped concentrate Finland’s national industrial expertise within the region: two thirds of Finland’s national GDP is located within a three-hour drive within the 120-hectare ECO3 circular economy area. 

Project SÄILÖ reuses building material to reduce CO2 

Furthering Tampere region’s green transition, the SÄILÖ project has helped two cities, Orivesi and Nokia, to develop unique building projects that reuse materials sourced from demolished buildings, all enabled through innovative public-private partnerships. 

Funded by the Finnish Ministry of Environment, SÄILÖ project organisers Circular Pirkanmaa are overseeing the renovation of a primary school that plans to use 40,000 bricks reclaimed from a former vocational school. The bricks will be used to build non-load-bearing partition walls, cutting down on the environmental and monetary costs of buying and transporting new bricks. 

The SÄILÖ project also fosters public and private sector partnerships, sharing knowledge, relevant tools and land allocation processes across Tampere’s 23 municipalities. 

Project manager Karoliina Tuukkanen explained how reusing bricks enables the project to build with a lower environmental cost: “The biggest saving comes from CO2 emissions, which are zero compared to virgin materials. There have only been a few similar projects in Finland in the past, mostly in the Helsinki metropolitan area, but the model represents the future of construction, as it has a high CO2-saving potential.” 

In Nokia, the SÄILÖ project will use bricks reclaimed from a demolished retirement home to construct a sports centre. In doing so, the project turns disused buildings into material banks for the future, valorising the existing local resources. 

Results from the project already show that the cost of using reclaimed bricks will be similar to the price of new bricks but reduces the need for manufacturing new bricks greatly. Project SÄILÖ is therefore an environmental and economic success, given that circular solutions are not guaranteed to be the same price as the conventional product, especially with new operating models. 

As coordinator Karoliina Tuukkanen explains, “This building project has involved a lot of testing, for example in terms of safe reuse of materials, while doing some hard development and doing things in a completely new way. It has challenged the cities’ ability to change and think innovatively, which is not something that is taken for granted in a municipal organisation.” 

Excel-based sustainability tools 

The innovations of CCRI Pilot region Tampere also extend to developing standardised tools, which help building professionals to be consistent in their sustainability reporting. For example, the Excel-based ‘Circular economy criteria for land allocation’ tool, developed by the ReCreate project and Circular Pirkanmaa, offers construction professionals a catalogue of ready-made circular economy criteria and recommendations for their assessment, scoring and verification. 

Independent professionals have also cooperated to develop circular solutions in the region. Developed by Antti Koponen in collaboration with Mira Jarkko from the Helsinki Circular Cluster, the Excel-based ‘Qualification Tool for Reusable Construction Products’ similarly helps building and construction authorities to agree on new standards for reused construction materials, helping the Tampere circular economy area. 

Ultimately, CCRI Pilot Tampere region’s openness to circular solutions has allowed projects to reduce the negative environmental effects of construction. By valorising local, waste building materials, connecting public and private entities and creating an efficient circular economy area ecosystem, these projects have reduced Finland’s carbon emissions and supported Europe’s green transition. 

If you are interested in learning more about this CCRI Pilot region, or the projects featured in this article, visit the Tampere Region webpage.