Case studies showcase replicable sustainable, circular, and innovation procurement approaches and strategies. Our resource centre contains over 200 case studies which detail the methods used, the obstacles overcome and successes achieved in implementing sustainable public procurement. Below is a selection of representative case studies that contain inspiration and guidance on how to implement sustainable, circular, and innovation procurement in relevant sectors.
The Metropolitan City of Rome Capital has been monitoring GPP since 2009, and in 2016, it introduced a new monitoring system linked to the public procurement electronic information system. This innovative, digital system makes it possible to require departments to attach relevant environmental criteria to procurement procedures.
Barcelona City Council has been implementing SPP for almost two decades, and in 2006 it launched the +SCC programme which introduced firm purchasing commitments which are applicable to all council departments. Participatory processes have been central to the development of the +SCC Programme, and were used to develop strategic goals and define compulsory criteria for 12 high priority procurement categories.
The Catalan Government has multi-pronged approach to encouraging SPP of vehicles, including: provision of Green Vehicle Procurement Guide, development of specific government agreements to encourage procurement of low emission vehicles, supporting the Catalan Ecolabel, and promoting sustainable mobility.
The City of Copenhagen is dedicated to ensuring its food and catering service is healthy, sustainable and appetising. The City has a target to supply 90% organic food across its 900 municipal canteens. In 2014 the municipality ensured that bids for fruit and vegetable contracts would include a variety of different sorts, varieties and types. This was the Procura+ Award winning tender in 2016 for Sustainable Procurement of the Year.
Plavinu Municipality wanted to sustain good quality catering in their school for a reasonable price. They also wanted to include circular aspects in the procurement in order to be more sustainable. The catering tender provided the opportunity to test circular economy aims, and is the first example of a circular public procurement supported by the Circular PP project.
Flanders has set a target that at least 50% of products purchased in its latest office supply framework are sustainable. To achieve this, it used a mix of technical specifications and award criteria to encourage the inclusion of sustainable stationary products in the product inventory. In addition, it used contract performance clauses to ensure that the contractor works with users of the framework to ensure that the amount of sustainable products they are choosing is increasing over the lifetime of the contract.
In its procurement of towels and overalls, the Ministry of Defence of the Kingdom of the Netherlands (MODNL) followed a circular policy and explored requirements around recycled fibres. The winning bids creating estimated savings of 233,000,000 litres of water, 69,000 kg CO2 and 23 MJ of energy. This was the Procura+ Award winning tender in 2017 for Innovation Procurement of the Year.
The framework agreement for cleaning services, valid between December 2014 and November 2017, had the purpose to carry out environmentally-friendly cleaning services in buildings, premises and facilities with an administrative use.
A competitive dialogue process was launched by Waterschapsbedrijf Limburg (WBL) for the design, construction, maintenance and operation of a waste water treatment plant (WWTP) in Venlo, with a high production of biogas, and reduced sludge.
This tender represents a model for fast IT renewal processes achieving remarkable energy savings. Estimations are based on approximated volumes for 7,000 basic computers, and 2000 laptops and 2,000 monitors. Calculations show that total lifetime cost savings for electricity are estimated to be 288,000€ and 27,4% CO2 emissions saved.
Rijkswaterstaat (RWS) procured works and services to widen the A6 motorway, aiming for the motorway to be energy neutral after construction. RWS developed instruments to calculate the CO2 emissions, then selected a tender using a combination of price and quality according to the economically most advantageous submission. This was the Procura+ Award winning tender in 2016 for Tender Procedure of the Year.
In 2015, Hyvinkää Municipality set an ambition to procure the first ecolabelled pre-school in Finland. By building a pre-school to the standards necessary to achieve the Nordic Swan Ecolabel, Hyvinkää was able to promote a range of sustainability considerations, including promoting energy use and using sustainable building materials and methods. The winning bidder not only built the school, but also managed the ecolabel verification process, which the school successfully achieved in August 2017. This was the Procura+ Award winning tender in 2017 for Sustainable Procurement of the Year.
When Public Health Wales (PHW) moved offices in 2016, it wanted the successful bidder to use as much of its existing office equipment, furniture and flooring as possible, as well as supplying remanufactured goods from other sources. The winning consortium of social enterprises supplied over 2,500 items, with only 6% from new stock. The circular approach diverted 41 tonnes of waste from landfill with a CO2 saving of 134 tonnes. This was the Procura+ Award winning tender in 2017 for Tender Procedure of the Year.
Innovation-oriented public procurement to purchase renewable (bio-based) aprons for the health sector in the Swedish region Skåne. The Regional Council decided to change their purchasing approach for protective disposable aprons to one which results in a purchase of a more environmentally-friendly product alternative. Skåne’s healthcare system in fact disposes of five million aprons every year (approximately 100 million for the entire Swedish healthcare sector), which together makes them one of the products with the highest carbon footprint.
A case study on Madrid implementation of responsible timber procurement. Madrid is listed in the ‘green’ list of the WWF campaign “Cities Friends of the Forest”, amongst the top scoring in Spain for implementing procurement policies that give preference to suppliers of wood certified with the maximum guarantee of social and environmental criteria.
Best practice case study as part of the European Commission GPP In practice series focusing on TfL's extensive market engagement for the procurement of innovative lighting. TfL introduced a new WLC and performance based process for lighting. The process has been met with such success that it will now be applied to a range of other assets commonly found across London’s transport network.
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