Agile Piloting

Climate Street project buys ideas worth 1,000 to 7,000 euros within the Programme for Agile Piloting to create innovative climate change-preventing services and solutions to residents and businesses in Iso Roobertinkatu.

Three pilots that all start in the autumn have been chosen for the programme in June 2016: Sustainable Meal, Resource Efficient Existing Buildings and Zero Food Waste (read the news No food or properties wasted – Agile pilots chosen for Iso Roba! (in Finnish)). The programme aims to promote joint experiments between different actors and speed the development of good concepts into innovations and new businesses. The programme assists in the start-up of experiments and makes it easier to catch up with users.

The competition searched for solutions and services that

  • reduce the energy consumption of the residents and businesses in the street
  • improve the introduction of renewable energy sources in the area
  • decrease the need for motoring in the pedestrian street
  • reduce the possible food waste in the area and the greenhouse gas emissions caused by food
  • increase the area’s attractiveness and climate-friendly business operations

Agile pilots will be carried out in a period of 1-6 months by the end of 2016.

Introduction of the competition (pdf)

The experimental ideas enrolled in the competition are listed below according to the applications.

  1. Bicycle charger, Solarvoima Oy. Mobile phone charging station that uses pedal power brings energy close to everyone. It is a fun and a concrete way to generate energy by yourself. It’s also very handy if your mobile phone battery is dead.
  2. Energy-efficient maintenance manual for housing cooperatives, Fatman Oy. Fatman Oy offers maintenance manual composition services with the focus on energy issues to housing cooperatives. The maintenance manual service includes the writing of a maintenance manual in consistency with the KH card database. Besides, the recommended energy saving measures arising from the executed energy audit are included in the long-term maintenance plan. Thus, the maintenance manual includes remote reading for energy consumption. This is achieved with the help of electric utility interfaces.
  3. Solar energy for everyone, Solar-Arena.com. Charging roof with solar power – Solar-Arena.com. Or terrace roof without tiles, made from panels. Use your money to generate solar power.
  4. Electrifying Iso Roba, EkoRent Oy. The EkoRent electric car is the perfect city car. It’s emission-free and quiet. Also, car sharing reduces the number of private cars in the city. Our customers love the service. We want to offer an affordable, clean option for the wide public.
  5. Cycling generates electricity, Finnish Cyclist’s Federation. Better quality of air in the city. You can charge your mobile phone or laptop and generate electricity by pedalling the exercise cycle in the Climate Street.
  6. Rent an electric cargo bike, Finnish Cyclist’s Federation. Rent an electric cargo bike and support the cleaner climate!
  7. Solar smoothie, From Waste To Taste ry. Solar smoothie is a happy bike bar that runs on solar power. It is part of the From Waste to Taste project. The bike runs in Climate Street and sells healthy smoothies and toasts that are made of waste food collected from grocery stores. At the same time, the operation of the solar panel is tested in all seasons and weather conditions.
  8. Help Automaton, Coreorient Oy. This experiment offers a new way to help the local residents in all possible tasks and in climate-friendly events.
  9. Nifty Neighbour – No delicacies wasted in Iso Roba, Yhteismaa ry. Nifty Neighbour is a neighbourhood social media tool with 4,000 users all around Finland. It is used especially in Helsinki, in several neighbourhoods of the city. In Nifty Neighbour, people and organisations can advertise for events, discuss with each other, borrow or lend goods, launch initiatives, and seek or provide assistance. Nifty Neighbour also acts as a communication channel to reduce food waste in the neighbourhood. We inspire restaurants, grocery stores and residents to inform the neighbourhood about the expiring and soon-to-be-wasted foods and products. The users are reached by an email message, so food waste is quickly distributed forward and eaten away.
  10. Shared facilities to be utilised without the boundaries of the housing cooperatives, Kliffa Innovations Oy. Kliffa is a service for housing cooperatives and residents. It offers the shared facilities of a housing cooperative for the utilisation of the housing cooperative itself and for all other residents in the area easily, flexibly and more efficiently. As it is possible to make a reservation for the use of shared facilities also in other housing cooperatives than the one the person is living in, it is possible to specialise the shared facilities so that they better match the different needs of the residents. At the same time new and versatile local services are created a lot easier. Kliffa makes it more fun to live in a city!
  11. Sustainable Meal, Green Event Oy. Sustainable Meal unites two megatrends: food and responsibility. We want to demonstrate that food prepared according to the principles of sustainable development is tasty. Another point is to show what kind of possibilities there are for small food operators to develop their services. The restaurants participating in the experiment get a unique chance to develop their own responsible food operations.
  12. Resource Efficient Existing Buildings, Aalto University. REEB: Resource Efficient Existing Buildings aims to develop new digital methods for making occupancy measurements so as to facilitate resource efficiency in commercial buildings. The latest trends in real estate such as coworking, renting homes on AirBnB, remote working and activity based offices all revolve maximise use and are enabled by digitilization. They also echo wider global sharing economy trends such as car sharing and the disruption of the taxi industry that also aim to maximise use The REEB occupancy measurements help building owners and tenants by calculating how much space is needed by their operations. Any leftover space can be rented out to new tenants, rented to coworking spaces or used for events via services such as venuu.fi. The data can also help to optimise the scheduling of energy control systems. In addition to the benefit to the building owner or tenant our data also collects the data that makes it possible to measure energy efficiency in a way that does not punish resource efficiency. This method could be used by national buildings in future and the concept has already been raised in a recent EU standard.
  13. ReKindle, Electroforge. ReKindle provides biogas for public cooking use such as for pop-up restaurants, various events, public grills by utilizing the organic waste. Its byproduct is nutrient rich fertilizer which can be used by the florists, gardeners and hobbyists.
  14. Zero Food Waste in Iso Roba, Froodly. Zero food waste in Iso Roba through a swipe! Froodly (means food-friendly) is going to provide a tool that-has-it-all for dwellers in Helsinki. Fighting food waste is no longer daunting. It can be fun! Discounted food offered by supermarkets, restaurants, cafes and bakery from popular Iso Roba can be all found in this compact app. Save food, save money. Why not? Also, Froodly is not just an app. Events are flowing in and you are all invited to enjoy in Iso Roba! Stay tuned!
  15. Power Monkey, Radicl Entertainment Oy. Power Monkey teaches us to understand energy. Today we are already counting calories, steps and the number of likes in social media, but only a few of us know exactly what one kilowatt hour can produce. The Power Monkey application is about to change this by making energy easily understandable and even fun! With the app it is easy to see how much and where energy is spent in everyday life. You can compare the energy consumption between a flight and a flat screen TV or find out how much energy is spent during one sauna session. This is not necessarily done to reduce energy consumption but to understand how we use energy and to decide where and how we really want to use energy. You are welcome to join us and learn. Soon energy will be a quantity we know as well as time or money! With thorough knowledge it will be easier to understand projects like the installation of solar panels in Iso Roba!
  16. Mob your neighbours, Natural Interest Oy. Neighbourhood date gathers the residents and other interested parties in the area together to take part in a nice and intimate mob event in Iso Roobertinkatu in August. The purpose is to get to know your neighbours. The urban outdoor living room acts as a meeting point. In the living room the DJ is responsible for the cosy atmosphere and lighting is used to create a nice ambience. A Facebook event is created for the occasion. The electricity needed in the living room is produced with a mobile and emission-free SolarMob solar plant.
  17. Ensavetec, Ensavetec Oy. We have a solution that saves energy and reduces living costs. The ENSAVETEC shower heat recovery device collects energy from the shower water. There is no more need to waste energy down the drain.

 

The Programme for Agile Piloting to the Climate Street is funded from the City of Helsinki Innovation Fund. The programme has been developed in the Smart Kalasatama project.

 

For more information, please refer to:

Mira Jarkko, Environment Centre of the City of Helsinki, firstname.lastname@hel.fi
tel. 040 334 1629

Mikko Martikka, Environment Centre of the City of Helsinki, firstname.lastname@hel.fi
tel. 040 519 7525