Benefits
- S02 emissions reduced by 99%
- NOx emissions reduced by 99%
- CO emissions reduced by 99%
Challenge
Gjakova is a city located in Kosovo*, with a population of around 40.000 citizens. Traditionally, a part of the city was heated by a district heating system, based on heavy fuel oil, with low efficiency, high production costs and high greenhouse gas emissions. The Government had to subsidise the fuel costs significantly.
Fuel price increases constrained the company to decrease production and the supply of heat per customer. Consequently, many of the plant’s customers switched out of the system and the customer base shrank. As a result, the plant was operating at only 9 MW, instead of its design capacity of 38 MW.
Summary
The district heating company of Gjakova J.S.C. commenced the biomass based heating plant project in February 2019. The plant is expected to be put into operation in autumn/winter 2020.
The plant is designed for 16.4 MWth and 1.1 MWe. The works are contracted to an Austrian company and the supervision of work to a French company.
The new heating plant with cogeneration technology will be built on a green field offered by Kosovo* authorities about 1 km from the existing district heating network. The plant will be fuelled with biomass which includes wood residues from forestry, wood waste from primary and final wood processing and vine trimmings.
The Energy Community Secretariat has played an important facilitation role in this project.
Finance
Significant technical assistance to preparing all the required project documentation was offered by the European Union, through the Western Balkans Financing Framework (WBIF). Moreover, a large investment grant of approximately 15 million Euro was offered by the European Union Office in Kosovo*.
Moreover, the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) will provide support to the project in terms of capacity building (administrative, operational and financial capacities) and investments in improving energy efficiency of the municipal district heating system, including the network and the Regional Hospital.
Results
The new heating plant will supply heating to a floor area of around 206,000m2, of which 55% is residential, 39% consists of public institutions and around 6% is commercial. In addition to its positive impacts to the environment and human health, the project will contribute to economic development in the area of Gjakova. Biomass fuel production will bring economic benefits to the private sector involved in the biomass supply chain. The plant will also contribute to the security of energy supply by reducing thermal energy losses and increasing the share of renewables in Kosovo*’s energy production mix.