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Gothenburg

Gothenburg is Sweden’s second largest city with approximately 590,000 inhabitants. As the biggest port in the Nordic Region, Gothenburg is by tradition a centre for trade, transport and industry but also for tourism and major international events. In light of such industrial activity, one of the city's key ambitions has been to become more sustainable by reducing 90% of emissions from heavy goods transport by 2030.

In this regard, Gothenburg has not been inactive: for the last seven years, the city has made lowering waste truck emissions a priority. Through a collaboration with Volvo, the city asked the manufacturer's trucks to develop a tightly specified electric waste collection truck that met the requirements of the routes, topography, speed and load capacity needed to operate in the city. The collaboration model was fruitful also for spurring Gothenburg's use of electrified transport: through the ElectriCity green city project, a roll-out of Volvo electrified buses was implemented within the city, in association also with ABB, who supplied the city’s charging stations, among others.

Credit: Emmy Jonsson

Gothenburg's ambitions did not stop there: in 2021, the Swedish port city began its plans to establish a zero-emission urban area covering a large area in the centre and surrounding districts of the city, under the title 'Gothenburg Green City Zone', where fully climate-neutral and zero-emissions transportation systems will be developed and tested. The aim of this zone, unlike many other zero-emissions zones, is not to entirely prohibit combustion engine vehicles from entering, but rather to establish extensive testing and demonstration sites, helping to spur technological innovation for sustainable mobility solutions. This initiative was brought forth from another collaboration with Volvo ,as well as RISE Research Institutes of Sweden, showing the city's proactiveness in fostering multi-actor collaborations.

Indeed, this has been evident through their involvement in POLIS: as the hosts of our Annual Conference 2021, the city played a central role in bringing together over 550 participants to discuss and exchange knowledge on the common challenges facing our urban environments and transport systems, with a focus on innovation, sustainability and co-creation. They have also been actively involved in a number of our projects, such as SPROUT and SCALE.

You can find out more on their website, or follow them on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.

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http://www.goteborg.se/wps/portal