Carbon-free heating at Rovaniemi Airport

Airport operator Finavia and Napapiirin Energia ja Vesi (Neve) have entered into an agreement on the heating of Rovaniemi Airport with carbon-neutral district heating.

“We have worked systematically to reduce the climate impact of our airports for over ten years now. We reached an important milestone two years ago when all our airports became carbon neutral. Our objective is to achieve zero net emissions in 2030, and we continue on our journey towards emissions-free airports. The cooperation with Neve is an important step along this journey,” says Henri Hansson, SVP, Airport Infrastructure, Sustainability, Safety, Security & Compliance at Finavia.

The climate impact of airports originates from the heating of buildings and the energy consumption of vehicles.

 “In order to eliminate our carbon dioxide emissions, we must focus on increasing the use of renewable energy and improving our energy efficiency,” Hansson points out.

Vihreä Lähilämpö (Neve’s carbon-neutral district heating product) is an excellent choice for Rovaniemi Airport, because it supports the key measures to reduce carbon dioxide emissions Finavia has identified in its climate programme. Neve produces its district heat from renewable and locally sourced fuels. 

According to Kristian Gullsten, CEO of Neve, the company generates heat mainly from wood-based fuels: wood chips and wood industry byproducts such as dust, bark, cutter shavings and recycled wood. Neve is also planning to use energy generated by burning dried sewage sludge in the near future.

“We have made significant investments in reducing our emissions, and our objective is to make all our production emissions-free by the end of this decade. Thanks to our Vihreä Lähilämpö, we can offer carbon neutral district heating to the majority of our customers,” Gullsten says.

FINAVIA CORPORATION
Communications

Images for the press:
Finavia: https://finavia.materialbank.net/ui/shares/w16460360/188535/fi/
Napapiirin Energia ja Vesi Oy (Neve):  https://finavia.materialbank.net/ui/shares/w16994100/330691/fi/
 

Further information:

Finavia Media Desk
tel. +358 20 7082002 /comms@finavia.fi

Napapiirin Energia ja Vesi Oy
Timo Jokinen, Development Manager for District Heat
tel. +358 50 5898854 ja timo.jokinen@neve.fi

Airport operator Finavia manages and develops 21 airports around Finland. Finavia offers Finns the best long-haul flight connections in the Nordic countries and ensures smooth travel to and from Finland. Finavia airports’ customer experience, snow-how, sustainability efforts and promotion of flight connections are among the best in the world. All Finavia airports are carbon neutral. In 2019, Finavia’s turnover amounted to EUR 389 million and it had 2,775 employees. Without Finavia’s efforts, the rest of the world would be far away.

Napapiirin Energia ja Vesi Oy (Neve) is a multi-sector group within the Arctic circular economy, serving more than 60,000 local customers in Lapland as well as hundreds of thousands of travellers. We support the success of Lapland at every moment. Neve’s services include electricity transmission, water supply, the production, services and sales of district heating, infrastructure services, construction of an optical fibre network and related services, services for electric traffic, digital services and circular economy products. Neve is owned by the city of Rovaniemi. It is the parent company in a group that includes Rovaniemen Verkko Oy, Napapiirin Vesi Oy, Napapiirin Kuituverkot Oy, Napapiirin Infra Oy, Aurora Lämpö Oy and Ranuan Bioenergia Oy. The group’s turnover is over EUR 70 million. It has around 140 employees who complete over 700 days of training annually to develop their expertise. The history of energy business in Rovaniemi dates back over 100 years. The distribution of electricity began in 1914 and district heating operations in the 1970s.