Sustainability is at the core of all VTT operations

Responsibility and sustainability show in everything we do: It is our task to develop sustainable solutions for our customers and society. It is equally important to ambitiously develop the sustainability of our own operations. The principles of sustainability are taken into account in both our internal operations and all research and service activities.

Sustainability priorities Environmental goals Standards and certificates Code of Conduct VTT Whistleblower Information security

Sustainability always taken into account

The development of sustainable solutions is our most significant act of corporate responsibility and sustainability, since our operation is based on resolving the grand challenges of our time. We strive to understand the needs and opportunities of businesses and society. We help to meet these needs by co-developing impactful scientific and technological solutions in collaboration with our partners. At the same time, we help our customers to succeed and to promote sustainable growth and well-being in society.

Read more about our sustainability program and targets.

Find out more about our sustainability in the annual and sustainability report. You can find our previous annual reports also from the same location. 

Research impact

We solve the world’s biggest challenges through science and research, help our customers develop their business sustainably and responsibly, and transform the society towards sustainability through technological innovations.

  • Our research choices provide solutions for promoting the achievement of UN's Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). On our Annual and sustainability report's Sustainability at VTT section is the assessment from our researchers on which UN Sustainable Development Goals our projects have the greatest positive impact. Connecting projects to the SDGs started in 2021 and is now done in all self- and jointly funded projects as well as in the commercial projects valued over 50,000 euros.
  • We link our projects to the SDGs. They can also be found in our research information portal.

Environment

VTT's most significant environmental action is to develop sustainable solutions and technologies for the use of customers and society. In our own operations we take climate action towards carbon neutrality, prevent negative impacts on biodiversity and use natural resources sustainably. In our environmental policy, we emphasise the following matters:

  • The goal of our research choices is to have a positive handprint: we develop solutions that promote sustainable development and improve the state of the environment, minimising the harm to the environment.
  • Our goal is carbon neutrality.
  • We continuously improve the energy efficiency of our operations in cooperation with property owners and our researchers.
  • We make the use of materials and resources more efficient and contribute to minimising the amount of waste and maximising the circular economy in the long term.
  • We keep VTT's impacts on biodiversity low and gather more information on the impacts of our operations.

We implement these goals with the help of our environmental management system ISO14001, which is applied by all our facilities.

Social

As an expert organisation, competent and healthy employees are a key resource and asset for VTT. We continuously improve personnel wellbeing, sense of community, and opportunities for continuous learning. VTT aims to be the world's most meaningful place to work. Our priorities regarding social responsibility are:

  • Safety: Everyone comes to work healthy, everyone leaves healthy.
  • Diversity, equity and inclusion: An inclusive, diverse workplace that is free of discrimination.
  • Competence development: We develop our competence continuously and support our personnell in it.
  • Responsible partners: We only engage with responsible partners
  • Value chain sustainability: We minimize any human-and labour rights risks and impacts in our value chain.

We value people as they are. Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) are an integral part of our sustainability, and we are strongly committed, for example, towards gender equality within our working community and in the wider research ecosystem. Find out more in our Gender Equality Plan.

Governance

Code of Conduct and misconduct reporting channel

One essential part of our Compliance programme is the Code of Conduct, which is based on VTT’s good reputation as a reliable partner. It entails such issues as the reliability and high-quality of research findings, our operating practices in relation to our partners, and our commitment to occupational health and safety as well as environmental issues.

Further reading:


We are using the Whistleblower notification channel for reporting suspected abuses. It allows us to become aware of any abuses and non-compliance with our guidelines and ensures that such issues are appropriately addressed. Read more about our Whistleblower channel here.

Governance model

Anticorrupction activities

The anti-corruption duty applies to the entire personnel and management of VTT and its subsidiaries, as well as all of VTT's operations. VTT is committed to complying with the United Nations Convention against Corruption (2006/58) and national and European Union legislation.

Read more:

Information security

We always respect the laws and regulations concerning the protection of privacy when processing personal data.

Further reading:

Research ethics

VTT is committed to following the highest research ethics and research integrity in all its research activities. We continuously develop our practices to ensure that our operations remain ethical.

VTT is committed to complying with research practices in accordance with TENK guidelines.

Research Integrity (RI) | Finnish National Board on Research Integrity TENK

Standards, certificates and memberships

ISO 14001, ISO 45001 and ISO 9001 certificated operational system

Our operational system has been granted the following certificates:

Please find a more detailed description of our operational system here.

Memberships

We are a member of the FIBS corporate responsibility network, and we have also joined the UN Global Compact initiative on corporate sustainability.

Other related documents: