The Marshal Office of the Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, Poland, organized Expert Mission in April 2022. The topic of the meeting focused on the effective use of renewable energy sources in the industry as a part of the RESINDUSTRY- Policies for Renewable Energy Sources in industry – project.
Finnish Good Practices in the Spotlight
Sandor Luukkanen, a Project Director at Lahti Energia, presented two examples showcasing the use of local renewable energy sources (RES) in industrial applications and in compliance with circular economy principles.
Within the recent turbulent atmosphere in the global energy market, Lahti Energia seeks new ways of producing CO2-free and non-depended energy (on imports of fossil fuels) for its customers. Poland faces the same challenge, on a larger scale, and thus the RES use is rapidly growing. The main RES growth is foreseen in wind energy in Finland and Poland. (Luukkanen 2022.) During the meeting, Tomasz Gałucha, the Chief Specialist at Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, pointed out that nearly 30% of RES share in total electricity production puts the region at the forefront in Poland.
Case Viking Malt
Viking Malt is a malt-making factory located in Lahti, Finland. They decided to replace the old heating system with a bioenergy solution, thus decreasing CO2 emissions and the dependency on natural gas supply and related costs. The new system consists of a 13 MW biomass-burning steam (13 bar-g) boiler able to burn chips (forest residuals from harvesting and other forest industry sidestreams) and agro-biomass (local oat hulls). Besides providing heat and steam for the malt-making process, the boiler heats the factory buildings. In addition, the boiler is fitted with a flue gas scrubber with heat recovery to be used in the local district heating system. Ash produced is circulated back to forests or used for road construction. Lahti Energia executed the project from 2014-2016. (Interreg Europe 2020; Luukkanen 2022.)
Case Fazer-Xylitol Factory
Karl Fazer Oy (Fazer), a Finnish bakery and confectionery, together with Lahti Energia sought a solution for the new circular economy-based energy production to replace natural gas. Fazer’s rye crisp factory, new oat mill, bakery and from 2021 a new Xylitol factory, all located in Lahti, require a steam supply for the production. Lahti Energia built a biomass-fired heating/cooling steam production facility directly in Fazer’s factory area. Cooling is provided by a special absorption cooling system of the generated steam. The unique fuel for the new heating facility is derived from the production side streams in the factory area, mainly from the oat hulls, which undergo the Xylitol production process. The facility and heating plant have been running since the end of 2021. (Interreg Europe 2021; Luukkanen 2022.)
According to Katarzyna Kowalewska, acting Deputy Director of the Department of Investments and Development, more and more companies strive to contribute to minimising negative climate change. The Marshal Office actively supports all initiatives and projects on the use of RES, especially in times of energy crisis. She added that thanks to RESINDUSTRY and Expert Mission, they had a chance to gain new experiences about solutions in the field of renewable energy sources from other countries. (Kowalewska 2022.)
Authors
Sandor Luukkanen works as Project Director at Lahti Energia. an energy company 100% owned by the city of Lahti, providing energy solutions to its customers.
Katerina Medkova works as an RDI specialist at LAB University of Applied Sciences and is a Project & Communication Manager in the RESINDUSTRY project. RESINDUSTRY is supported by the Interreg Europe Programme funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and co-financed by the participants.
References
Interreg Europe. 2020. Biomass boiler for efficient malt making process. RESINDUSTRY. Cited 29 Jun 2022. Available at https://www.interregeurope.eu/good-practices/biomass-boiler-for-efficient-malt-making-process
Interreg Europe. 2021. Biomass Heating Production From Food Industry Waste. RESINDUSTRY. Cited 29 Jun 2022. Available at https://www.interregeurope.eu/good-practices/biomass-heating-production-from-food-industry-waste
Kowalewska, K. 2022. Deputy Director of the Department of Investments and Development. Marshal Office of the Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship. Interview 6.6.2022.
Luukkanen, S. 2022. RESINDUSTRY-Best practices, Lahti Energy – cases Viking Malt and Fazer. Presentation given at RESINDUSTRY Expert Mission on 7 April 2022.
Links
Link 1. Interreg Europe. 2022a. Project Summary. RESINDUSTRY. Cited 29 Jun 2022. Available at https://projects2014-2020.interregeurope.eu/resindustry/
