Sustainability - Our environmental handprint
Sustainability

Our environmental handprint

Measuring our environmental handprint makes the positive environmental impacts of our expert work visible in our client projects. We measure our environmental handprint in our large projects using a method we developed for this purpose.

The role of built environments in the achievement of national and international environmental targets is critical. We are taking care of the environmental targets set for our client projects as if they were our own. As the only design and consultancy company in Finland, we measure our experts’ environmental handprint systematically.

Environmental handprint refers to choices or decisions made in engineering, construction management and other consulting work to reduce the project's negative environmental impacts and to increase its positive environmental impacts. 

As no ready-made method for assessing the environmental handprint in expert work was available, we development the Environmental Handprint Index on the basis of scientific research (e.g., VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland) and a report by the Finnish Association of Consulting Firms SKOL on designers’ handprints. 


THE ENVIRONMENTAL HANDPRINT INDEX ASSESS THE REALISATION OF 12 AREAS OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN PROJECTS AND OUR ROLE IN IT.

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The method is based on self-assessment. At the beginning of a project, our project manager or expert evaluates the opportunities in the 12 areas of sustainable development (on a scale of 0 to 100), and at the end of the project, our team’s role (passive, neutral or active) in their realisation is assessed. The areas to be assessed vary to some extent, depending on the sector and the project.

The size of the handprint is reported as an index value on a scale of 0 to 100.


ENVIRONMENTAL HANDPRINT INDEX PROMOTES EXPERTISE AND BENEFITS CLIENTS AND THE ENTIRE SECTOR.

An environmental handprint, which is demonstrated with an index helps us increase our role as a sustainable development partner in client projects, contributing to the development of the entire sector. Continuously working to increase our handprint, we learn from the measurements and compile a databank of sustainable construction solutions.

The larger the environmental handprint, the smaller the client project’s negative environmental impact.  

Our experts continuously increase their expertise in sustainable built environments, and with each project, the amount of information on successful solutions stored in the databank grows.


OUR HANDPRINT IS REFLECTED IN SUSTAINABLE PROJECTS FROM WHICH BEST PRACTICES CAN BE SHARED WITH OTHERS.

 Read more about our handprint in practice and check out our projects:

 

TIKKURILA COMPETENCE CAMPUS: 79

A vehicle-free green central campus rises along the railway line.

Read more (in Finnish) 

STADIN AO, HELSINKI VOCATIONAL COLLEGE AND ADULT INSTITUTE, ROIHUPELTO CAMPUS: 90 

Circular economy highlighted at Finland's largest vocational school

Read more (in Finnish) 

OULU COURTHOUSE: 52 

Oulu courthouse is a pilot of low carbon construction

Read more (in Finnish)