At Campus Lindholmen, low-speed electric vehicles combine with specially designed trucks to collect sorted waste and distribute goods to a variety of recipients. The result is an 80–90 percent reduction in heavy-vehicle traffic.
Campus Lindholmen in Gothenburg covers an area of less than 10 hectares (one-tenth of a square kilometre) but is a vital hub for developing sustainable waste collection and goods distribution and reducing heavy-vehicle traffic. The area is located at one of Chalmers University of Technology’s campuses, with a high concentration of scientists, students and businesses in technology and engineering.
The innovative waste management at Campus Lindholmen centres around a transport terminal that consolidates goods and waste from 15 schools and businesses. The Lindholmsleveransen (Lindholmen Delivery) transport system was started in 2008 and includes both goods and waste, and mainly aims to reduce heavy-vehicle transport.
80–90% less heavy-vehicle traffic
The concept involves all goods for the area being delivered to a local micro terminal, after which distribution is provided by an electric mini truck that delivers goods around the area and brings waste back to the terminal. The micro terminal is equipped with everything required to compress, sort and handle the waste correctly before it’s transported for recycling. The concept has cut heavy-vehicle traffic at Campus Lindholmen by 80–90 percent.
Next step
Since January 2020, the transport system at Campus Lindholmen has been operated by regional waste and recycling company Renova Miljö (www.renova.se). Its mission includes participating in the development of more sustainable and low-carbon solutions at Lindholmen. The next step is to introduce an electric waste truck, which will empty waste on site just like a traditional waste truck. This will lead to even less transportation traffic, since the new solution will eliminate transportation back and forth of smaller waste bins. Another idea involves testing and implementing lockable delivery boxes that allow customers to pick up and drop off goods when they want.
Unusual tendering drives innovation
The public management organisation in this case, Älvstranden Development, has used ‘innovation tendering’, allowing tendering businesses and the market to propose solutions. This model sets the goal but does not specify how to reach it. By encouraging innovation, the public sector allows the market to develop new solutions, which helps drive sustainable change.
The positive results and experiences from Campus Lindholmen demonstrate that this concept can serve as an inspiring example for other cities and regions.
