Have you ever wondered how many hours of light do they have in Lapland in summer? And during winter? You might have heard about the conditions they have to face in the northern points of Europe, extremely low temperatures and the variation of daylight hours depending on the season. However, have you ever thought about how these conditions impact the energy usage of those communities?

We speak with our SMARCTIC project partner Hannu Korhonen, from Lapland University of Applied Sciences (Finland), to discover more about how the energy consumption and performance during summer months is.

According to him, “in most parts of Lapland we have ‘nigthless night’ when the sun does not set at all. In the most northern parts, the nightless night lasts for 72 days”. Isn’t it amazing? At this stage of the year, Finnish communities do not need to use a large amount of energy while expending time at indoors. Korhonen explains that they currently spent an average of 12 hours inside buildings. There is no need for heating, as opposed to winter when there is a lot of need for it! “The average temperature is 20 degrees during the day and 10 during the night”. Regarding the weather, the most typical conditions during summer are the sunshine, rain and moderate winds.

On top of that, they do not usually face any weather challenges that impact the energy usage and, therefore, the consumption stays low. Nevertheless, our partner mentions that flooding might occur in the beginning of the summer when the snow tends to melt quickly.

Are you curious about what happens during winter months? Stay tuned with SMARCTIC!