Located at the mouth of the river Motala Ström and at an inlet from the Baltic Sea, the municipality of Norrköping has 130 000 inhabitants. Norrköping is also home to an industrial symbiosis network involving diverse range of symbiotically connected private and public sector actors. Key actors of this network and their synergistic connections are depicted in the diagram below. The synergistic relations in and around Lidkoping provide a range of environmental benefits, examples of which include the following:
  • Reductions in greenhouse gas emissions: Having a CHP plant that is primarily fueled by waste derived fuels and biomass provides significant reductions in CO2 emissions. This is partly because meeting the heat and steam demand of domestic and industrial users by the CHP is a much more efficient than the users operating their own boilers. Moreover, the CHP plant is replacing coal or other fossil fuels–that would have been difficult to realize in individual boilers.
  • Reduction of waste landfilling: The amount of industrial and household waste that needs to be landfilled is significantly reduced, by using such wastes as fuel in the CHP plant or as substrate for biogas production.
  • Reductions in fossil-resource dependence: Bio-ethanol and biogas reduce the dependence on fossil fuels, whereas use of bio-fertilizers from ethanol and biogas production reduces the dependence on chemical fertilizers in agricultural activities.