Cool4City project met its objectives to facilitate the development of innovative waste management systems in two regions in Finland – the Helsinki Metropolitan area and Mikkeli region – by studying and implementing four pilots in the project regions as well as to develop and raise environmental awareness of citizens in the project pilots regions. Outcomes of the project include increased waste separate collection on-the-site of housing companies, raised awareness of citizens on services of municipal waste management companies on waste sorting stations and collection of reusable goods for further integration into the circular economy value chain.

Cool4City work toward meeting the project objectives was implemented in a set of activities, such as: studying, analyzing and describing municipal (focusing on households) solid waste management systems’ operational models and practicalities in the Helsinki Metropolitan area and Mikkeli region of Finland as well as in St. Petersburg  and Leningrad region of Russia;   get to know in practice –visits to municipal waste management organizations’ sites in Finland (Cool4City partners’ – Helsinki Region Environmental Services HSY and Metsäsairila LLC of Mikkeli region); analyzing and describing changes in waste management legislation in EU, Finland and Russia; implementing and analyzing results of the pilots (2 pilots in the Helsinki Metropolitan area and 2 pilots in Mikkeli region). The role of communication and collaboration as well as visibility activities with the purpose of awareness raising cannot be overestimated when we have such a topic as municipal waste and circular economy.

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Finnish project team visited different nature destinations in the areas of Päijät-Häme and South Carelia. As a result, an extensive benchmarking report Insights for developing nature and culture trails: based on benchmarking Finnish nature destinations was published in the LAB publication series. Publication presents insights for developing nature and culture trails. Insights were collected 2 from 18 Finnish nature destinations, which included national parks, ecological and cultural trails and ecological education and visiting centers. After each benchmarked destination there is a compilation of lessons learned from that specific location, recommendations about actions to take into consideration for developing nature trails in general, are presented more specifically.

Written articles were published on multiple themes related to nature travel, e.g: nature activities, extended reality, storification, engaging visitors, volunteering, thinking circular, well-being effects, futures thinking and megatrends. An article on the background and goals of the project was also written in the LAB Health annual review. All these articles offer interesting examples that could be taken into consideration when establishing the protected area in Kyrönniemi.

The articles are available in Kurenniemi – cultural value of Russia and Finland through M. Agricola trail

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LALAPETE project main aim was to provide reliable and comparable data on environmental awareness and behavior. The project creates an action plan to promote sustainable behavior and facilitate cross-border cooperation in the field of circular economy.

LALAPETE work toward achieving the objectives organized through a set of activities and project has reach great number of relevant stakeholders during the implementing period by organizing seminars & webinars & training sessions & other events. Main events organized during the first project year were following: Circular Fashion” contest, Baltic Circular Economy Forum” BCEF, Archipelago 2121, Environmental week at city of Lahti and UpCycle – Circular Economy & Design event.

The results of environmental awareness questionnaire were available in February 2022 and related on analyses all activities were mostly based on the environmental awareness questionnaire results. After the analyses partner teams started to plan implementation of practical measures for project stakeholders. Because of the change in world situation measures based on questionnaire results were planned and conducted only by Finnish partners and they took place in Finland.

During the year 2022 the questionnaire results were presented on three different events, Circular Economy board game “Ecopol” Finnish version was created, launching of competition to facilitate the development of functionable and practical solutions to organize recycling and waste-sorting in small-kitchen homes and offices, environmental education for schools in Sustainable School Food-pilot project started in Lahti and Greenreality carnival at the end of Aug 2022 including five the most important results of questionnaire presented with billboards and  Circular economy stand, which was called “Bring when coming, take when leaving”.

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The “Prevention and utilization of Invasive Alien Species – PURE” project was carried out from January 1st, 2021, to April 30th, 2023. The Overall objective of the project was to secure natural biodiversity, safe, pure, and clean environment by preventing the spreading of the Invasive Alien Species (IAS) in the programme area.  This objective defined the aims and the tools to reach these aims.

To fight Invasive Alien Species requires common effort from all of us, the local communities, property owners, local and government administration, and non-governmental organizations etc. The main question is how to recognize IAS and how to fight them in eco-friendly and effective ways. The “PURE” project tried to answer these questions by organizing awareness raising events in local communities and schools in the City of St. Petersburg, Leningrad Region, and South-Eastern Finland.

In the awareness rising events organized during the project implementation the focus was to disseminate information about Invasive Alien Plant Species such as Himalayan Balsam, Lupin and Hogweed. With the representatives of local communities was also organized practical bees. The project managed to educate a notable number of people from the different age groups. The youngest participant of these various events was 3 years old and the oldest over 70 years. The project also studied possibilities to develop and pilot new ways to mow down, collect, sort and store hogweed safely and tried to find out methods and technologies for hogweed utilization and processing.

The studies of possibilities to utilize and process Hogweed material in laboratory scale produced interesting results. The Hogweed material was studied as a source for useful oils and extracts and as a feedstock material for the biogas process. The project partners reached interesting results, which hopefully can be used in the future. It seems that hogweed contains chemical compounds which are widely used in cosmetics, in foodstuff etc. It seems also possible to produce energy from hogweed using biogas process.

Fighting the Invasive Alien Species is essential for maintaining and supporting the biodiversity of the environment. The project carried out small but concrete part in this fight. The project will continue its work by the online course about Invasive Alien Species. Also, the project publication and Guide for Teachers will be further available.

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The project’s overall objectives “To maintain and preserve the freshwater reservoirs and the sea clean and to attract tourists and new inhabitants with pure and clean environment” was reached through practical restoration activities, as well as through improved recreation management on the shore areas. Three different mires and a water ecosystem were restored in South-East Finland and a rare inland dune biotope was restored in the Leningrad region, Russia. Recreation management was improved by launching three history-based canoe routes on the Hiitolanjoki river basin in Finland. In the Leningrad region, Russia, an eco-trail was projected and constructed in Priozersk and the recreation management plan was created for the Motornoe-Zaostrovie planned protected area.

Based on the practical activities, carried out at the pilot territories of the project, recommendations were published both on the restoration methods and sustainable recreation. Also, a scientific article, booklets and short video films were published about the project results. Best practices of shore area restoration and sustainable management were exchanged between partners during study visits, as well as via online meetings. The awareness of the importance of the shore area conservation was raised and disseminated wider in the Program region through the project exhibition and numerous publications on project activities in mass media and at partners’ own resources.

Short films related on project activities: Shore protection short films

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AWARE project organized three extensive week-long training camps for Russian and Finnish young university students to increase cross-boarder collaboration in the matters and issues of waste management, sustainability, waste reduction, circular economy, robotics in waste separation and so on. With near 100 participants and extended activities among school students, after the camps, project has reached young pupils, early & late teens and young adults with the AWAREness activities, related of understanding how to reduce waste and live more environmentally conscious life.

In 2021 AWARE collaborated with Savonia to offer “Green Data Future Solutions project Data Boost for Sustainability -hackathon”, for students to get hands on possibility to innovate solutions to sustainability issues. In 2021 AWARE project also collaborated with CroboDITT project to organize “International hackathon programme in Disruptive Information Solutions” for Finnish and Russian students. As a follow up AWARE project collaborated with Digital & Circular project to organize Savonia Trash Design hackathon in April 2022 for circular economy ideas, how to use side streams and industrial “waste” components for new and innovative product ideas.

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Environmentally Friendly Smart Organic Agriculture (EFSOA) objectives of the project were to conduct scientific research and to create information and technical conditions for the development of competitive, environmentally safely organic production, on this basis to establish the demonstration smart organic farm. Comprehensively assess the impact of organic production on the environment, and to optimize it in the pilot farms. To ensure that professionals and the public are widely informed about the benefits of the local organic products for human health and environment, and to identify possible channels for the supply of local organic products to the food market, children’s and medical institutions.

The achievements of the project were a side stream of plywood manufacture (crushed spruce bark) was studied as a means of improving yield and quality of organic cereals. Assesment of agri-environmental performance (yield, soil carbon storage, nitrogen leaching loss) of organic farming in comparison to conventional farming in South-Savo (Finland) and Leningrad region (Russia) for current climate and future climate scenario. Estimates of GHG emissions were performed for Southeast Finland, South Savo, and Leningrad region, showing 40% lower emissions under organic agriculture. In South Savo the environmental impact of the organic farming was monitored using traditional methods (water quality field measurements, soil, and water samples) but also new monitoring instruments, such as online soil monitoring system and multispectral imagining by drone. Organic consumer survey has carried out in the several grocery stores of South Savo, and educational institutes of Leningrad region.

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Main activities include creation of systematic approaches to ensure and communicate about the ecological, economic, cultural and social sustainability and to analyze the needs. Scientific research findings are popularized to attract wide audience by the means of info-points and centers, cooperation with museums and using mobile information platform.

Project activities aimed to reach these goals consisted of improving the management of the sites regarding the preservation of biodiversity and mitigating negative impacts of visitors. These consisted of “limits of acceptable change” (LAC) plans for Metsähallitus sites in Finland and cross-border communication of management methodologies between experts. Promotion of recreational use included setting up info points concerning these areas. Awareness of climate change and reducing biodiversity was communicated to the public through expositions, IZI.TRAVEL mobile guides and an innovative solution combining pilot demo zone and a multilingual informative landing page. Impacts will be realized mostly after project termination through enhanced management of protected areas and via improved guidance of the public on site. Information communicated to the public through expositions and online materials will increase awareness of the nature and changes in the nature.

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SIMREC project focused on mitigating the environmental risk arising from the oil transportations in the Eastern Gulf of Finland by developing tools to improve the inter-organisational and international oil spill management preparedness. The project’s objective was to develop skills, tools, and practices to support the design and organisation of cost-effective simulator-based oil spill management trainings for groups with diverse backgrounds, cultures, and locations. This was targeted through developing and testing the online connectivity of bridge simulators in different geographical locations, to allow the joint rehearsals from distance.

The project also analysed the training needs in the Baltic Sea area, developed step-by-step protocols and a computational risk model to support the design and organisation of effective exercises and training programmes. The developed tools and ideas were tested in practical simulator exercises involving search and rescue authorities and operative personnel. As a key output of the project, a roadmap document was produced and published, summarising the results, and synthesising them to a set of practical recommendations. Part of the results were also published in two peer-reviewed scientific articles. SIMREC final seminar, targeted to authorities, educators, and RDI actors working on the related topics, generated lively discussion among its international audience. The event led to concrete ideas and plans concerning the future implementation and development of the SIMREC results in the Baltic Sea area.

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