Sustainable Industrial Environments of the Future

The three-year EU project The Sustainable Industrial Environments of the Future will lay the foundation for sustainability cooperation between industrial companies and public actors in the Umeå region. The aim is to contribute to a sustainable future for society, companies and its employees.

The project has a broad support. Umeå Energi, Komatsu Forest, Volvo trucks, Ålö and ABB participate, as well as the research institute RISE, Region Västerbotten, Umeå Municipality and Umeå University, via the Department of Informatics. ESAM, the Forest Technology Cluster and västerbotten Chamber of Commerce are also partners in the project, together with companies such as the subcontractors Nomeko, Jitmech, Ferex, Ilogistics, Rototilt, Cranab and Ume Assistance.

Umeå Energi is the project owner and stands for coordination and propulsion of the three-year EU project, which runs 2020-2022. The project is financed both by the companies themselves and by public funds from Umeå Municipality, Region Västerbotten and the Swedish Growth Agency and the EU.

The goal is to lay the foundation for a completely new collaborative platform for industrial sustainability in the region, which has been named Viable Business Hub.

Develop climate-neutral industrial environments

The collaboration project was created because the parties see a great need to jointly develop sustainable, CO2-neutral industrial environments that contribute to increasing the attractiveness of the site, strengthening the competitiveness of companies and reducing climate impact. The sustainable industrial environments of the future will contribute to sustainable development and want to set an example for the implementation of the Agenda 2030 goals.

The work should be imbued with a system perspective, which means that all work should be based on effects on the whole, the system, and not just the individual parts.

Objectives of the project

Some of the goals of the sustainable industrial environments of the future are to

  • develop a common innovation process with a positive CO2 contribution that generates sustainable products and services. 
  • strengthen innovation capacity and contribute skills to reduce CO2 burdens and increase the competitiveness of SMEs.
  • develop at least 10 joint development projects/innovations that contribute to increased sustainability
  • develop new concepts, methods, business models and technical solutions within the four focus areas Industry 4.0, Energy System, Transport and Mobility and Social Sustainability.
  • become a global role model and disseminate and communicate results and lessons learned regionally, nationally and internationally.
  • establish a sustainable collaborative platform for the development of sustainable industrial environments, with long-term organisation and funding

PARTNERS