Rotterdam excels as a sustainability-driven city
11/10/21
The 2021 Glasgow Climate Change Conference, a United Nations summit on climate change, is taking place in Glasgow until November 12th, 2021. Accelerating climate action and meeting deliverables of the Paris Climate Agreements are the focal points of the summit along the plans of limiting the global warming to a 1.5 degrees Celsius. As the societal consensus on climate change increases, Rotterdam is an example of a pioneering city offering plenty of conscious and sustainable practises. The following Rotterdam-based companies and organisations are sustainability-driven, focusing on leading impactful change.
The Ocean Cleanup: aim to clean up 90% of plastic in our oceans
The Ocean Cleanup with their headquarters based in Rotterdam, are focusing on implementing newest technology to help combat plastic in the oceans. This non-profit organisation are working on revolutionary innovative technology which helps clean up bodies of water throughout the world. An inspiring and necessary mission to help tackle the rising climate change problems. If you would like to know more on The Ocean Cleanup and how you can contribute, please check their website.
Pieter Pot: on a packaging-free groceries mission
Pieter Pot are rethinking the use of packaging for groceries by offering a sustainable and simple solution – by reusing pots and jars you already own at home. According to statistics, over 26 billion plastic food packaging are bought per year in the Netherlands alone. The impact that this company makes is clear – in 2021, Pieter Pot were named Initiative of the Year by the Sustainable Brand Index. For more information about this Rotterdam-focused initiative, please visit Pieter Pot’s website.
Rotterdam architects take sustainability to the Dubai 2020 Expo
The Dutch Pavilion has won the Sustainable Project of the Year award for the sustainable pavilion design by the Rotterdam architects V8 Architects in collaboration with local companies Expomobilia, Witteveen & Bos and Kossmanndejong.
The pavilion contains a modern circular climate system in which water is harvested from the air, energy is collected from the sun and edible plants and mushrooms are grown. Locally rented sheet piles and pipes were integrated as main bio, eco and reusable materials. By returning all materials after Expo 2020 Dubai ends, the pavilion’s ecological footprint has been kept minimal. For more about Dubai 2020 Expo please visit our article and to discover more about V8 Arhictects, check their website.
The earth’s most sustainable healthy drinks company – innocent drinks opened their production factory in Rotterdam
On the first week of November, 2021 innocent drinks opened their production factory in the Port of Rotterdam. innocent drinks committed to being CO2 neutral across the entire business by 2025, have focused on sustainability at core in everything that they do. Over 200 million euros were invested in the new Rotterdam-based factory which is CO2 neutral and all-electric and will be the first WELL-certified factory in the world!
The factory is utilising smart use of heat pumps to reduce overall energy consumption for heating and cooling by an estimated 50%. The location for this factory was alsoplanned carefully as the logistics will reduce the length of the supply chain by 20%. And furthermore, innocent are working towards a zero-emission transport, making their orange juice supply chain fleet 100% electric!
For more information on innocent’s sustainability mission, please visit their and to check out the tour of the Rotterdam factory, check out this post!
RET – Rotterdam public transport company are on a mission to offer energy-positive transport for everyone
Rotterdam is known as a sustainability-focused city and you can see it in every aspect, transport sector being one of them. The Rotterdam public transport company RET have set a goal – to offer energy positive transportation by 2030! By showing a leading example of sustainability, RET is involving and inspiring other change-making companies to follow their lead, one of which being Eneco, with their own goal of becoming fully energy neutral by 2035.
To read more about RET’s sustainability mission, please visit this article and to discover more about Eneco’s sustainability plans, check out their announcement.
Wattlab – Smart Solar Energy from Rotterdam
Wattlab combines the passion for an environmental change with innovative tech solutions and offers latest solar applications for your use. Using solar panels to deliver a zero-emission result, Wattlab are taking that step forward towards a more sustainable and accessible for all – clean energy future. According to them, collaboration is key in making big climate-focused changes. So far, Wattlab as worked together with Picnic, offering custom solar panels to the Picnic’s transport, in collaboration with Damen Shipyards and Blommaert Aliuminium, Wattlab contributed to solar hatches for ships. For more on Wattlab’s initiative and their current collaboration projects, please check out their page.
