Now you can swim and fish in Växjö’s lakes that were once too polluted. 
Photo: Mats Samuelsson

If there something that Växjö has a lot of, it is fresh water and trees. This little city in southern Sweden is surrounded by dozens of lakes and millions of trees, and these natural resources have important roles in the story of how Växjö received the title “Europe’s greenest city” and how it hopes to live up to that honor.

The once-polluted lakes in and around the city have provided an important lesson in how environmental action at a local level can have an effect. The trees are a renewable resource with which the city is tackling some of today’s most pressing challenges: energy security and climate change.

Fossil-fuel free

Växjö was named “Europe’s greenest city” by the BBC in 2007, which led to massive interest in the city from policymakers, entrepreneurs and journalists from around the world eager to learn from its example. The visitors — two or three foreign delegations per week ever since — soon learned that Växjö had not jumped on the early 21st century’s environmental bandwagon but had in fact been cleaning up its act for years, even decades.

In 1996, for instance — one year before the Kyoto Protocol set binding targets for greenhouse gas emissions and raised awareness of climate change — the city decided to become fossil fuel free.

The key to Växjö’s achievements in reducing CO2 emissions is that about 90 percent of the energy used for heating in the city, and about half its electricity comes from trees. Waste from the local forest industry — branches, bark and sawdust — is burned to generate heat and power, and the Sandviksverket plant where this takes place has become a must-see for delegations on their study tours of Växjö.

Local forest industry waste is transformed into heat and power at the Sandviksverket plant. Photo: Jerzy Kociatkiewicz (CC BY A SA) 

Something for nothing

Lars Ehrlén, manager of the Department of Heat and Power at City of Växjö, says: “The alternative to burning this waste for heat and power is to leave it in the forest to be broken down by natural processes. And then the CO2 emissions will be about the same as the emissions from our chimney. But what we gain from this is energy.”

About 55,000 people get their domestic heating from the plant via the municipal district heating system, which since last year also provides district cooling to buildings including the university and hospital.

But the story of Växjö’s environmental engagement dates back to the 1960s, way before its fossil fuel-free pledge in 1996 and the conversion of the Sandviksverket plant from oil to biomass in 1979.

As Sohie Kim-Hagdahl, environmental coordinator at City of Växjö explains, politicians learned back then that environmental problems can be tackled if the political will is there. “In the 1960s the lakes in the city were very polluted,” she says. “So it all started with a local environmental problem that you could see and smell. Local politicians made the decision to restore the lakes, and this showed that we could do something ourselves about environmental problems.”

Building on the momentum generated by this early success — today you can fish and swim in the city’s lakes — Växjö drew up a list of ambitious environmental targets. On energy, the city aims to be fossil fuel-free by 2030. The milestone of a 55 percent reduction in CO2 emissions per person by 2015 has been set, and by 2009 — the most recent year for which figures are available — a reduction of 34 percent had been achieved.

Fuel from waste

“Passive” apartment blocks that require no external energy source for heating have been built; solar panels have been installed in schools and on the roof of City Hall; and charging stations for electric cars can be found around the city. A biogas plant producing vehicle fuel from sewage and school food leftovers is operational, and a bigger plant, which will also use domestic waste as its feedstock, will be opened next year.

Kim-Hagdahl admits that reducing emissions from the city’s transport system will be the biggest environmental challenge, but a new initiative has shown potential. "Since last year we are coordinating goods distribution to about 400 municipal workplaces with an initiative which is unique in Sweden and Europe,” she says. "This reduces the number of vehicle journeys and their emissions. The driving distance is 33 percent less, and we save several million Swedish kronor in transport costs.”

Keep aiming higher

Växjö has no plans to surrender the “Europe’s greenest city” label, and Börje Svensson, a local science teacher who got involved in environmental issues in the 1960s after observing first-hand the deterioration of the lakes, intends to make sure that it doesn’t. A regular debater on environmental issues in the local press, he would like the municipality to be even more ambitious. He is disappointed in the levels of investment in public transport, and points out that other Swedish municipalities are outperforming Växjö on the purchase of organic food.

“The city was a real pioneer in cleaning up its lakes, but the city’s expansion is threatening them with pollution again,” he says. “Växjö is good on environmental issues, but it could be even better.”

David Wiles

David Wiles is a British journalist living in Sweden who regularly writes about Swedish environmental technology. Inspired by his subject, he drives a car fuelled by biogas made locally from waste.

The author alone is responsible for the opinions expressed in this article.