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Tero Tulokas became a new Chairman of Finnish Energy Club

The Finnish Energy Club’s Annual Meeting has elected Tero Tulokas as its Chairman. Tero Tulokas acts as the CEO of Oilon Group Oy.

Full members of the Board:

Tero Tulokas, Chairman of the Board                  Oilon Group Oy

Tuure Stenberg, Member of the Board                   Gebwell Oy

Mauno Pakarinen, Member of the Board                  Kolmeks Oy

Katja Granlund, Member of the Board                   Planora Oy

Jussi Vanhanen, Member of the Board            Vexve Oy

Kati Ruohomäki, Member of the Board                   EK

Deputy member of the Board

Esa Teppo Planora Oy

Expert Member of the Board

Mika Finska Business Finland

A lot has been said lately

OECD Ministerial Council Meeting stated in May 2014 the commitment to limit effectively the increase in global temperature below two degrees celsius above the pre-industrial levels. A number of actions were mentioned, including markets for green goods and services, phasing out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies and to jointly mobilize 100 billion US dollars per year by 2020 from variety of sources, public and private.

US Secretary of State John F. Kerry and Foreign Secretary of UK Philip Hammond declared in October: “Smart Energy Policy is a Win to the World”.

The presidents of USA and China, Barack Obama and Xi Jinping gave in November 2014 a Joint Announcement on Climate Change, in which, first of all, China intends to achieve the peaking of carbon dioxide emissions around 2030.

In last July the President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker had selected his priorities: “We need smarter investment, more focus, less regulation and more flexibility” when using public funds. This should allow us to mobilize up to 300 billion euros in additional public and private investments over the next three years. These should be targeted in infrastructure, education, research and innovation, renewable energy and energy efficiency, and especially in projects that can help the younger generation back to work.

In January Minister of Economy Jan Vapaavuori stated: The Finnish companies contain hidden growth potential which must be mobilized. The first campaign will concentrate in cleantech companies.

Great for the future of the youngsters and great for the clean technologies! There is the will and there is funding.

The global cleantech markets continue growing. The markets grow fast in China and elsewhere in Asia, but they do grow also in Europe. Finland positions well in the EU’s eco-innovation and in Cleantech innovation indices, which is promising for the future. Until now, we have not been able to tap our fair share of the growth, as can be seen in the environmental business numbers of Statistics of Finland.

In the Green Growth Day success stories developed with the funding through Tekes Green Growth programme were presented: the Finnish offering is growing through innovation.

Another study over the Finnish cleantech business ecosystem has been done. An interpretation, if a company is cleantech, is a bit cumbersome, and the overall results depend on the interpretation. Nevertheless, one of the main take-aways is: Cleantech SME’s do need help to grow, the more help they need to innovate, and cleantech is no exception among SME’s.

When saying this: we cannot forget the large companies either. The prerequisites to do business in and from Finland must prevail.

A number of growth programs have been and will be started to assist the growth oriented companies in different cleantech sectors through Team Finland. It is a no-brainer to remind that small companies have difficulties first to reach the potential customers and second, the easiest found customers are often far too big to be served by single SME’s from the other side of the globe. Co-operation is needed in the limits the competition laws allow. It is worth to follow the news to join the gangs. Team Finland will do our best to try to reach you as well.

An example of a fantastic cleantech target would be the plan of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India to clean-up the Ganges river. It has to start by cleaning most of the industrial and municipal wastewaters led to the river. We have the technology. Who would participate? Anyone? Equipment? Chemicals? Services? The region is near and Finglish is understood at least to start with.

Whether we talk about bio or circular or green or blue economy and growth, clean technologies are the enablers. Without technology, to reach the global targets, we should head back towards the life, in which most of the people were functioning in small farm-size circles like hundred years ago or so. There were reasons, why it started to change, and this is too short a story to get into those reasons. We don’t want to and we cannot go back: we are quite too many to do so.

Instead of playing with the buzzwords, we need to concentrate the efforts in doing the real thing, realistic, targeted, profitable projects, which is the only way ever to reach even close to the common target: max two degrees temperature increase above the preindustrial levels.

The keyword to do this is: together.

Kaisu Annala
Strategic Director in Cleantech
Ministry of Employment and the Economy

Energy year 2014 DISTRICT HEATING

One-third of district heat production now carbon neutral

21.01.2015

Share of domestic fuels more than half

Wood biomass and other biofuels continued in strong growth as district heat energy sources in 2014, with a growth rate of nine per cent. Analysis by Finnish Energy Industries (ET) shows that the share of wood, wood residue and other domestic renewable energy sources rose to 31 per cent. When the use of industrial secondary heat is included, the share of carbon-neutral district heat production rose to as much as 33 per cent.

“The share of domestic fuels exceeded 50 per cent for the first time,” says Director Jari Kostama from ET. One significant and growing source of additional energy in the district heat production palette is waste, which has allowed the use of fossil fuels to be reduced. The Vantaa waste-to-energy plant was commissioned in 2014, and there are other large district heating systems utilising municipal waste in Lahti, Oulu, Vaasa, Kotka, Riihimäki and Hyvinkää. The share of waste in district heating fuels was already close to 6 per cent last year.

The increased share of biofuels has also led to a reduction in the carbon dioxide emissions from district heat production. The carbon dioxide emissions from district heat production were 5.7 million tonnes, showing a drop on the previous year of four per cent. The average carbon dioxide emission was 165 g per each kilowatt-hour generated.

Fossil fuel use continued to fall – peat retained its position

Natural gas was used to generate 22 per cent of district heat and CHP electricity. The share fell four percentage points on the year before, with a 16 per cent drop in energy volume. The share of coal, 24 per cent, fell by two percentage units, in terms of energy volume it was used 10 per cent less than the year before.

Peat use has now stabilised, its share of all fuel use remaining at the previous year’s level of 13 per cent. Although the 2014 district heat production was lower than the year before due to milder weather conditions, the energy volume of the peat used to generate district heat and combined electricity remained unchanged. Oil accounted for three per cent of all fuels used, it is mostly used only in peak-load heating plants.

Share of combined heat and power generation increased

Last year, the volume of district heat produced was 34.5 TWh. As cogeneration with electricity it amounted to 25.6 TWh. The volume is a little higher than the year before. The share of cogeneration of the total district heat production rose by a good percentage point to 74 per cent.

The cogeneration output is sufficient to cover the heating requirement in an outside temperature of between 0 and -10oC, depending on location. At colder outside temperatures, peak-load heating plants are used to supplement the heat production. There were only a few such extremely cold periods in 2014. Of the heating months, only January was colder than normal. In terms of average temperature, 2014 was warmer than normal by a good degree.

The volume of electricity cogenerated with district heat was 12.6 TWh. The volume fell a little compared to the previous year. In combined heat and power generation, a third of the fuel quantity is saved compared to when they are produced separately. The emissions are reduced proportionally.

Warm weather reduced district heat sales by one per cent

Last year, district heat sales totalled 31.3 TWh. There was a slight drop on the year 2013. The drop was due to the milder weather than the year before.

At the end of 2014, there were almost 1.33 million homes with district heating, with 2.7 million people living in buildings with district heating. 55 per cent of the housing stock of the whole country were within district heating sales areas.

Most public buildings are connected to district heating networks. Almost half of the heating energy requirement for all our buildings is obtained from district heating. In the largest cities, more than 90 per cent of the heating energy requirement of the buildings is covered by district heating.

The monetary value of district heat sales was EUR 2.35 billion. The mean price of district heat inclusive of tax, including the energy fee and power charge, was 7.5 cents per kilowatt hour. The average price rose by about three per cent on the previous year.

Taxes make up a little less than 30 per cent of the average price of district heat. Factors influencing district heat price levels include e.g. the fuels used and their excise duties, system size and conurbation structure, mode of production and age of production plants, and emissions trading costs.

District cooling sales continued to grow

District cooling sales grew on the previous year by about 13 per cent, standing at 191,000 MWh. The growth resulted from the expansion of existing district cooling systems.

Helsingin Energia is the most important vendor of cooling energy, supplying 70 per cent of all the sales in Finland. In relative terms, the greatest growth was in the district cooling systems of Fortum in Espoo and that of Tampereen Kaukolämpö, both launched in 2012.

At the end of the year, the power demand of customers connected to district cooling was 224 MW, which is about 10 per cent higher than the year before.

Reliability of district heat supply excellent

Statistics collected by ET show that the reliability of district heat supply continues to be top class. In 2014, the district heating customer’s supply was interrupted on average for 1.8 hours, making the security of district heating supply 99.98 per cent. Most of the interruptions are planned and the customers are notified in advance. The work of connecting new customers to the network, planned basic improvement works and moving pipelines due to roadworks also cause supply interruptions.

The high security of supply is the result of systematic quality control, upkeep and preventive maintenance.

Open Energy year 2014 (ELECTRICITY) -slides

Further information:
Jari Kostama
, Director, Tel. 050 301 1870
Mirja Tiitinen, Adviser, Tel. 050 434 6994

© Energiateollisuus

Finnish Energy, Fredrikinkatu 51-53 B, 5th fl, PO Box 100, 00101 Helsinki   Tel. (09) 530 520 Fax. (09) 5305 2900