EcoSairila’s international partners

Association for Environmental Partnership (AsEP)

AsEP, based in St Petersburg, is an association with more than 40 members from the environmental sector. Most of AsEP’s corporate members are SMEs. The organisations and companies belonging to the association can work together to offer resource-efficient environmental technologies, design, solutions, and services. AsEP works in close cooperation with the local environmental authorities, and it is active in arranging various environmental events with its Finnish and Russian partners. AsEP has long been involved in international environmental projects. It is involved in two ongoing Finnish-Russian projects in the border zone:

BBC1 https://biocircularbusiness.com/ and Cool4City https://www.sefrcbc.fi/joint-monitoring-committee-selected-9-new-cbc-projects/

ITMO University

ITMO University is one of Russia’s leading ICT, optics, and photonics universities, and it offers five programmes of education: internet technologies and programming; information technology and drivers; photonics; cooling industry and food biotechnologies; and economics, management, and innovation. There are 43 research laboratories operating under ITMO. ITMO University’s operations are highly international, as it has approximately 180 partner universities around the world and is involved in many international exchange programmes. At present, one of ITMO’s main strategic goals is global integration, especially with European research, education, and innovation ecosystems. ITMO takes an innovative approach to promoting the commercialisation and market entry of RDI outcomes, and it ties in industry, SMEs, and regional and national authorities with research activities. ITMO is already recognised regionally as an innovative driver. ITMO takes part in many EU-funded projects and is involved in implementing the ongoing BBC1 project for regional collaboration in the border zone between Finland and Russia https://biocircularbusiness.com/ .

St Petersburg’s waterworks – SUE Vodokanal of St. Petersburg

The St Petersburg waterworks (Vodokanal) supplies water and wastewater services to the city’s 5.3 million residents and tens of thousands of companies and organisations. Vodokanal is owned by the city of St Petersburg, which is represented by authorised state bodies. Vodokanal’s main achievements in wastewater treatment:

• At present, 98.6% of all wastewater is treated in St Petersburg.
• St Petersburg has solved the problem of processing sewer sludge. The city has three sludge incineration plants.
• St Petersburg’s wastewater treatment plants have adopted a new process for removing nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) to meet HELCOM requirements. This has led to a reduction in nutrient loading in the River Neva, the Gulf of Finland, and the Baltic Sea.
• Vodokanal has introduced a biomonitoring system that checks the quality of the treated wastewater and the composition of the flue gases at the sludge incineration plant.

One of Vodokanal’s focus areas is raising environmental awareness. The company has a communication and training centre, which includes a water museum and an ecology centre for young people. An international centre of water excellence also operates on Vodokanal’s premises.

Water Smart Territories

The Water Smart Territories (WST) network is one of the EU’s thematic partnerships for industrial modernisation. WST aims to implement tangible inter-regional collaboration and investment projects in the water sector under EU funding programmes, including the Horizon Europe programmes. The network combines more than 20 European regions and clusters, one of which is the Blue Economy Mikkeli (BEM) cluster.

World Water Cities Forum