Policy & Cooperation Sweden Making a difference together
picture on top: Lantmännen
Händelö is situated just outside Norrköping, Sweden. With land, rail and sea-based access, Händelö was a logical choice for Lantmännen Agroetanol to locate their ethanol factory in 2000. The neighbouring combined heat and power plant could offer competitive energy prices but the critical point was that E.ON fueled their plant mainly by a renewable fuel mix. The combined outcome is that Lantmännen Agroetanol produces several things from this cooperation; namely, ethanol fuel for transportation, protein-rich animal feed and carbonic acid for the soft drink market.
E.ON provides district heating for the citizens in Norrköping as well as businesses. The other main actors in the Händelö consortium consist of Norrköping Municipality, Nodra (municipal utilities company), Norrköping Harbour and Linköpings University.
What is the mission of the project?
Händelö Eco-Industrial Park – world-leading industrial symbiosis between industry and city through bio-based and circular economy.
At Händelö Eco-Industrial Park, we make sure to utilise industry and city excess resources in a synergetic network of actors. Here, we are proud to display innovation and knowledge about green renewable resource efficiency. We welcome new enterprises and visitors to a location where together we prepare societies’ resources for a more circular and sustainable world.
Where and when did the project start?
The network involves cooperation between a range of public and private sector actors who have been working to reduce Norrköping’s carbon footprint since the early 1990s.
Currently a project is running which aims at developing further material and energy efficiency at Händelö, as well as recognising the current throughput of the actors’ part of the industrial and urban symbiosis. The project idea has been discussed for many years among the actors but has not been able to move until project financing was secured. The project began in January 2020 and is financed by participating actors and the European regional development fund. The project will run till the end of 2022.
Where is the project offered today?
The Händelö Eco-industrial Park is located in Norrköping, Sweden.
To whom is this project aimed? Who belongs to your target group?
Händelö Eco-Industrial Park has several target audiences we would like to reach and inform, including politicians and policy makers inside and outside Sweden, industries interested in becoming valued members of Händelö, suppliers of bio-based raw materials, students and future employees for Händelö businesses, and the local community in Norrköping.
picture: Händelö Eco-Industrial Park
What do you consider to be the most innovative aspects of your concept?
Our uniqueness lies in that bio-based raw materials and by-products from the food industry become new material for bioethanol and feed. By creating a private and public consortium for Händelö we want to further enrich the industrial cooperation for the benefit of all parties involved. Our offer is to also try and attract additional resources and industries to Händelö.
What are the most important impacts of the project in terms of sustainability?
LM Agroetanol produces a bioethanol which has a CO2 emissions savings of >95% compared to production facilities which are based on fossil fuel energy.
Which aspects are particularly interesting from a design perspective?
This “system design” is very much dependent on a favourable situation we have in Sweden with a large supply of renewable and bio-based raw materials for energy and ethanol production.
Do you also offer the service digitally?
The system design is physical, and we hope to strengthen our knowledge sharing rom a digital platform.
What are some interesting numbers about the project?
These insights were compiled from three master’s theses conducted in the spring of 2020 as part of the Händelö project:
A workshop with representatives from seven actors was held as internal mapping, which aimed to help the industry identify mutual synergy opportunities between each other. The case study identified about 50 different synergies and several added values in the Händelö area for the project to qualify further.
The purpose of a transportation study was to investigate the possibilities of a transition to fossil-free heavy-duty trucks for the industries at Händelö Eco-Industrial Park. From a technical and environmental perspective, electricity and compressed biogas are the best fuels to use for the lighter segments of heavy-duty trucks, as long as it is technically feasible. For heavier heavy-duty trucks, liquid biogas and ED95 are the most appropriate fuels and hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) and rapeseed oil methyl esters (RME) have capacities to best manage the heaviest segments. From an environmental and societal perspective, locally-produced biogas that considers residual flows in its production is the preferred fuel for heavy-duty freight.
The final master’s thesis investigated how the quantification of climate performance for an industrial symbiosis can be performed. The results from the conducted quantification indicate that a fossil-based stand-alone scenario (benchmark) would have 72% higher greenhouse gas emissions in comparison to the symbiosis.
What happens next? What are your goals?
The Händelö projects’ work packages will build on knowledge from the master theses and will focus on:
Further developing resource and energy efficiency
Sustainable transportation
Attraction of new businesses and materials