CDP, an organisation that gathers information and reports related to climate change, has maintained Helsinki on its A List of the leading cities of climate work.
Helsinki is one of the 95 A List cities in the world in 2021. Cities on the list are recognised for showing leadership and transparency in their climate action. The CDP listing is based on environmental information published by various cities in the CDP-ICLEI Unified Reporting System. In 2021, 1,000 cities reported their environmental impacts to CDP.
In order to make the A List, a city must have a city-wide emission inventory, emission reduction target and renewable energy target, as well as a climate action plan. The city must also perform a climate risk and vulnerability assessment and it must have a climate change adaptation policy. This year, the criteria have been tightened from what they were.
Helsinki moves up its carbon neutrality target
In the new Helsinki City Strategy for 2021–2025, the city’s carbon neutrality target has been brought forward from 2035 to 2030. Furthermore, the new City Strategy lays down a zero-carbon target for 2040. After this, the goal is carbon negativity, i.e., that more carbon dioxide will be absorbed in Helsinki than is being released into the atmosphere.
Between 1990 and 2020, Helsinki’s total emissions have decreased by 33 per cent. Over the same time period, the emission level per capita decreased by 49 per cent.
During the Carbon-neutral Helsinki 2035 Action Plan, adopted in 2018, the measures leading to the most significant emission reductions have been launched through investments in accelerating energy renovations of the private residential building stock (the Energy Renaissance operating model), considerable tightening of energy efficiency requirements for Helsinki’s own premises and service properties, tightening of plot assignment conditions, energy efficiency guidelines for apartments owned and constructed by the City of Helsinki and the launching of the roadmap for heating project.
The Carbon-neutral Helsinki Action Plan will be renewed in early 2022.
Established in 2000, CDP (Carbon Disclosure Project) is an internationally recognised non-profit organisation that gathers information on climate work in the public and private sectors around the world.