Metropolia’s first sustainability report has been published
In recent years, Metropolia has invested heavily in sustainable development. As a university community of almost 18,000 people Metropolia bear a great responsibility and have a great opportunity to tackle challenges and make a difference for a sustainable future.
Sustainable development is a cross-cutting theme in Metropolia's strategy. The goal is for sustainable development and responsibility to guide all our operations and for Metropolia to be carbon neutral by 2030. We strive for sustainable growth in Finland and internationally.
Metropolia's first sustainability report presents our work on sustainable development and the roadmap to 2030. The report opens up the most important results of 2021 in our sustainability work. The UN Sustainable Development Goals are included throughout the report.
Sustainability Highlights in 2021
In 2021, Metropolia began to implement the strategy for sustainable development in practice. Metropolia came together with the entire university community and created a roadmap that extends until the year 2030. The purpose of the roadmap is to bring the most essential sustainable development goals into the everyday operations of Metropolia.
Metropolia has emphasised allocating resources for sustainable development in order to achieve ambitious goals. At the beginning of the year, the Sustainable Development Manager and an Environmental Specialist started working at Metropolia. In addition, three new teams were established to promote sustainability work in the organization: core team, carbon-neutrality team, sustainable education team.
CO2e, or carbon dioxide equivalent, is a common unit for measuring greenhouse gas emissions. It allows us totally together the impact of various different greenhouse gases. (Source: Statistics Finland).
Sustainable University Community
The university community must operates sustainably, i.e., in a manner that is ecologically, socially and economically sustainable.
Metropolia’s goal is to be carbon-neutral by 2030. Achieving carbon neutrality requires that the carbon footprint is calculated comprehensively enough and reduced as much as possible.
In 2021, Metropolia´s carbon footprint was 6,898 tons CO2e. This is 3% larger than the previous yearresulting mainly from more precise calculation methods and increased cost levels. Most of the emissions were caused by procurement (47 %) and construction and other property maintenance (34 %).
Sustainability know-how
Metropolia’s goal is that every member of university community, whether student or staff, is an expert of sustainability. In 2021 Metropolia established a multidisciplinary sustainability education team, with the task of making visibly incorporate sustainable development into courses as quickly as possible. The goal is to integrate sustainable development into all of our education by the end of 2023. In late 2021 preparation work began on a sustainability course intended for all Metropolians.
Solutions to sustainability challenges
Metropolia’s innovation hubs are places where people come together to create innovative solutions to sustainability challenges. In 2021 Metropolia realized approximately 100 research, development and innovation projects in innovation hubs together with the partner networks and operators from working life. Students are also actively involved, and they are there to learn and create something new.
Challenges are being solved in Metropolia’s platforms, such as future housing platform SmartLab and Metropolia Proof Health, a provider of preclinical testing and research services.
Read Metropolia’s Sustainability Report 2021.
The Sustainability Report has been published as part of Metropolia's publications on Theseus. The report was written by Pauliina Kahra, Elli Ojala ja Marianne Vainikka. In addition, texts were requested from specialists from across the organization. In the future, Metropolia will publish annually sustainability report and its content will be developed as the sustainability work progresses.
For more information:
Elli Ojala
Sustainable Development Manager
Metropolia University of Applied Sciences