“Excellent innovations and solutions are being discovered all the time. Now we must ensure that they are also implemented,” Raninen states.  

Climate change will increase extreme weather phenomena, but the slow changes must also be identified 

Rivers bursting their banks, torrential rains, record heatwaves… Extreme weather phenomena are already tormenting Europe in many ways. However, slow climate change is not simply a question of extreme phenomena. For example, the utility company Thames Water has evaluated that the future damage caused by droughts could cost London up to 365 million euros a day if the infrastructure is not adapted to climate change.  

“In Finland, the impacts of climate change are generally happening slowly and are not yet as dramatic as in Central and Southern Europe, for example,” Raninen explains. “But even the gradually changing climate has complex and cumulative effects, both on natural ecosystems and urban infrastructures and economies.”  

In Finland, gradual change can mean shorter winters, warmer summers and longer heatwaves. Raninen feels that this may change our conventional design methods.  

“Our construction has focused on heating and combatting the everyday ‘nuisances’ of winter, such as coldness and snow loads. With warmer winters and hotter summers, the need for cooling in cities will increase, whereas heating will become less important. On one hand, we may experience more rain. And on the other hand, winters may also see greater snow loads than in the previous decades. We must reserve space on the streets for temporary snow storage, but we also need to learn how to make use of this space throughout the year.” 

We can increase our understanding of the changing climate, for example, by modelling its effects on cities.  

The solution lies in comprehensive understanding and cooperation 

As the impacts of climate change become more complex, more versatile skillset is required to understand the phenomena and find solutions to the issues. According to Raninen, we must in particular try to avoid the silo effect. 

“A comprehensive overview of climate change and adaptation measures requires a wide understanding and meeting of different interest groups,” Raninen explains.   

Solutions cannot be created within just one field of design. What is needed is collective thinking and expertise from several fields. The key thing is to combine different skills, so that instead of sub-optimisation, we create solutions that best serve the whole.  

“If the number of green roofs and solar panels in a city is to be increased, their locations must be determined based on data. If each operator only optimises their own plot, we may be unable to deliver the best comprehensive solutions and achieve the results required for adaptation objectives. As designers of built environment, we have the opportunity to support cities in finding holistic solutions,” Raninen explains. 

Data harnessed as a tool for design and implementation 

Raninen points to the Carbon Neutral Helsinki 2035 Action Plan as an example of a strategy that contains objectives as well as meters and measures. This is how it can genuinely guide both planning and implementation. For example, the action plan states that the proportion of heating provided by geothermal sources must be increased from the current one percent to 15 per cent by 2035. 

“When such an objective is recorded in the strategy, it forces the city to come up with implementation methods and to monitor and continuously measure how the objective is being met,” Raninen says. 

“Shared understanding of the impacts of climate change and a strategy that guides all design and construction provide are a good basis for a sustainable city,” Raninen summarises.