Visit by the Nordic Prime Ministers to the Active House in Stockholm Royal Seaport
Wednesday May 15th, the Nordic Prime Ministers visited an energy-smart apartment in the Active House in Stockholm Royal Seaport. The project "The Active House in the sustainable city" is one of Fortum's smart grid research activities in this emerging residential area of central Stockholm.
The family living in the apartment has access to information and technical solutions helping them to change their energy consumption, with the ambition to reduce both CO2 emissions and costs.
–We are delighted that the Prime Ministers show their interest in the future energy system, says Marie Fossum, head of New Business within Fortum. To be able to make the best use of more renewable energy production, there is a need for home equipment to communicate with other parts of the electricity grid.
–Today we download applications and content to our mobile phones. In the future, we will download functionality to home equipment, said Anton Gustafsson from the research institute Swedish ICT. Tools for energy consumption and information are examples of that.
Marie Fossum also commented on the importance of the completion of the Nordic end customer market as the way forward:
–Unfortunately this process has slowed down, and we hope for a greater engagement from the Nordic governments for the time ahead, Marie commented.
Karin Estmark, who lives in the apartment together with her husband and two teenage sons, shared her experiences with the solutions.
–We hope to become more conscious of our energy consumption and how we by simple means can change it in a smarter direction, Karin Estmark told the ministers.
Experts from Stockholm Royal Institute of Technology and from Swedish ICT will evaluate how the solutions influence the families energy habits and how they make use of the solutions provided by the research project.
Background – The Active House in the Sustainable City
The research project the Active House aims at new ways to relate to energy. The project will set up a full scale experience for the residents, where single solutions are part of an integrated system. The results may form a foundation for the creation of new business models for such products and solutions that are used in the project.
The project is owned by Fortum, and is led by Interactive Institute Swedish ICT. The project is co-funded with 10 million SEK by the governmental innovation authority VINNOVA. Other partners of the project include ABB, Electrolux, JM, ByggVesta, NCC, HSB and the Royal Institute of Technology.
From the left: Jyrki Katainen, Prime Minister of Finalnd, Fredrik Reinfeldt, Prime Minister of Sweden, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, Prime Minister of Denmark, Andreas Estmark and Karin Estmark (hidden) who lives in the apartment, and Marie Fossum of Fortum.