The Eyde Cluster (EYDE) consists of 27 members: 11 are major process industry companies, nine are key suppliers of technology and services, six are research or education institutes including one university, and one is an innovation incubator. EYDE is located in the Agder region in the south of Norway, and comprises 30 municipalities with a total of almost 300,000 inhabitants in the two counties, Vest- and Aust-Agder. Vest-Agder is Norway’s largest per capita export county, and the region has been home to process industries for over a century. Today, EYDE aims to maintain and develop its position as a “World Leading Cluster for Sustainable Process Industry” in an area with strong political ambition of becoming a leading international region for the production and distribution of renewable energy by 2020.
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Finding connections between value chains
Norway is a relatively expensive country for industrial processing and manufacturing, and has also tightened its environmental regulations over the last decades. Hence, pressure built by international investors motivated the forming of EYDE in 2007 by CEOs in the regional processing industry. The large multinational member companies share intense consumption of energy and raw materials, and can together cut expenditures through cooperation with the other members, despite belonging to different value chains. EYDE was initially formed as a network based on the “Vision 2050” report by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), which focuses on methods for resource efficiency. Having evolved from the aim to establish projects between the member companies, the cluster is now an important arena for technology development projects, both investing in and promoting research and development for increased energy efficiency and improved production processes and products. All member organisations, ranging from SMEs and research institutes to multinational companies, are also part of the Eyde Environment Program and sharing the same innovation and sustainability strategy.
Spotlight on: Eyde Biocarbon
Eyde Biocarbon aims to find sustainable economic solutions to replace coal and petroleum coke with biocarbon produced from regionally sourced wood. The large member companies Alcoa Carbothermic, Elkem, Eramet, and Saint-Gobain run the initiative, as they wish to replace the large amounts of fossil fuel they use with renewable alternatives. The initiative is at an early stage of laboratory testing, assessing the qualities of different processes to turn regional forest biomass stock into biochar, bio-oil and biogas. Biochar can substitute for the coal and coke used by Elkem and Saint-Gobain as a carbon source in melting processes; bio-oil can be upgraded to fuel oil or used as a feedstock for biodiesel production; and biogas can substitute for the natural gas used by Alcoa to melt recycled aluminium. The current laboratory testing is planned to be succeeded by the establishment of a pilot plant in 2018, followed by full-scale industrial production in 2020 – as long as the results show that the predicted net carbon emissions reductions from replacing fossil fuels with biocarbon can be achieved in practice and made profitable.
The support of regional development policy
In the EYDE case, it is evident that regional policy and funding opportunities have offered important support to the network’s determination to improve energy efficiency and decrease the use of fossil fuels and raw material in order to lower emissions and costs. Both Vest- and Aust-Agder counties have planning strategies that support renewable energy and energy efficiency in industry, and the Regional Development Plan for the Agder Region is a 10-year strategy focusing on supporting climate-friendly industry initiatives; collaborations between the industrial, academic, and public sectors; and giving high priority to business development addressing climate challenges. There are also regional funds for development and for research consistent with the regional policies. For example, the cluster has received substantial grants for the Eyde Biocarbon initiative and the Eyde 0 Waste program from the Norwegian Research Council, Innovation Norway, Regional Research Funds, Enova, the EU association SPIRE, and the Competence Development Fund of Southern Norway. The willingness of the member companies to cover the remaining costs shows a promising determination, and also builds a sense of ownership important to the success of the plans.
Regional dimension
By developing to adapt to current challenges and meet future conditions, the member companies of EYDE increase their chances of surviving long term in a climate-friendly society. Thereby, they support the welfare of the region in general and safeguard regional livelihoods in particular, especially by developing the plans to source biomass and produce biocarbon products locally. On a research level, they help push the development of clean-tech and sustainable business models, which can be shared to benefit the global transition to carbon neutrality. With the initial openness to companies from various value chains, more actors from different sectors could be invited to join.
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