Archive for Finland
Water quality is monitored frequently in Finland in accordance with the national and regional programmes and under environmental permits. The national programme is based on monitoring networks of rivers, lakes and coastal waters. Several times annually, samples from about 550 sampling sites are analyzed for 20 – 40 water quality variables. In addition, there are thousands of sampling sites under regional and local monitoring programmes. The results of the monitoring and control activities are stored in the national database maintained by the Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE). There are now more than 21 million records database since the 1960s. In the classification done for 2000 – 2003, data from 5370 lake sites, 3900 river sites and 1100 sea sites were used. In this period 2.6 million water quality records were entered into the database.
The Oriketo heating station – Finland’s largest biofuel-fired heating station
Posted by: | CommentsTurku Energia Ltd. (joint-stock power company owned by the City of Turku) has planned and built a biomass plant in Oriketo, the first one in Turku fired with biofuels. The plant, which was operational in 2001, has a biofuel-fired heating station (40 MW) and condensing plants (12 MW). With the new heating station, Turku Energia has been able to replace part of the district heat generated by fossil fuels and therefore secure the heat supply to Turku’s inhabitants in a favourable and environmental friendly way.
This plant been a very profitably investment. The operation of the station and the supply and transport of fuels offered about 20 new jobs. It produces approximately 300 GWh district heat every year, increasing the share of bioenergy in district heating up to 20% and compensating in that way the use of charcoal in Turku region. At an annual level, CO2 emissions are reduced by about 90.000 t, SO2 emissions by about 300 t and NO emissions by about 70 t.
District Heat Battery in Turku
Posted by: | CommentsOld gas storage had been unused for 30 years when Turku Energy Ltd. (company owned by the City of Turku) bought it and transformed it into district heating battery. This heat battery is a 6000 m3 container where heated water can be stored during low consumption period and used during consumption peaks. It has been calculated that this method saves 2000 tonnes of oil annually.
In addition, by giving to the old gas storage a new function, it has been possible to save and renovate a historically valuable building which otherwise would have been destroyed as in that moment it very deteriorated and badly contaminated by toxic matters.
The Kakola Heat Pump – environmentally friendly heat from wastewater in Turku
Posted by: | CommentsTurku Energy Ltd. owned by the City of Turku is building a huge heat pump into the new waste water treatment plant. This heat pump will produce clean energy from renewable resources – treated wastewater. The heat stored in the treated waste water will therefore be used in district heating network which now covers about 90% percent of the local markets. The current installation also produces district cooling which is fast growing market in the region.
Energy Expert Training in the Blocks of Flats owned by the City of Turku
Posted by: | CommentsThe Energy Agency of Southwest Finland organises energy expert trainings for the resident committees of the blocks of flats owned by the City Council. The aim is to have 1-2 experts in each block of flats. The candidates for the training are chosen by the resident committees. The role of the expert is to give peer support in energy issues to his/her neighbours. It is important to bear in mind that the expert is not a controller, instead, experts provide advice to other residents on heating, electricity, water and to some extend on waste issues.
The funding for those trainings comes mainly from the real estate company, owned by the City of Turku, which owns the block of flats.
All together about 100 experts have been trained. The main challenge is to evaluate and follow-up the progress from the experts once are trained. This monitoring is done through support meetings after the training.
Training for Housing Associations about sustainable heating systems in Turku
Posted by: | CommentsThe Energy Agency of Southwest Finland organises trainings for Housing Associations about sustainable energy solutions, specially related to heating systems. Trainings are organised based on the request of a particular association. Each association usually covers one residential area which usually means that most of the houses are of same age and facing the same problems with regards to their old heating systems. Trainings are related to changing of old heating systems.
Concept of Regional Energy Agency for Southwest Finland
Posted by: | CommentsEnergy Agency of Southwest Finland is a regional energy management agency, accordant with the SAVE II programme of the European Union. Main customers are the municipalities of the SW Finland and NGO’s but to some extent also private companies.
Aim of the agency is to increase the use of renewable energy sources, energy conservation and energy efficiency.
Main activities are related to development and implementation of tailor made service packages for the municipalities in SW Finland. Agency also organises different kind of campaigns and develops projects related to energy and climate issues. Cooperation with private companies usually deals with heating systems and energy auditing.
Agency was founded with support of EU funding but now-a-days funding comes from chargeable tailor made service packages for municipalities and from project funding instruments. The host city (Turku) covers some of the administrative costs.
The Energy Agency was combined with the Local Agenda 21 Office in year 2008 which gives more resources and possibilities to the work.
Energy Management in Municipal Public Buildings in Helsinki
Posted by: | CommentsIntroduction The City of Helsinki has a long tradition on energy management in municipal operations, both in terms of targets for specific heat and electricity consumption of the municipality and in terms of carrying out energy audits, energy monitoring, other technical measures and communication actions for energy conservation and savings. Objectives and target audience In [...]
Ekoviikki – Ecological Housing Area in Helsinki
Posted by: | CommentsDue to the strong commitment of the City of Helsinki for improving the environment and enhance sustainability, the City Council decided to built an ecological building site in the Viikki area, a new science suburb of Helsinki.
Ekoviikki is situated a mere 8 kilometres from the city centre of Helsinki. The Ekoviikki site provides housing for 2,000 inhabitants and represents a built area of 64,000 m2. Multi-criteria decision-making criteria have been applied to account for different aspects of sustainability in the city, site, and building planning. In that way, it has been possible to introduce innovative environmental and energy concepts in the housing area.
The largest solar projects in Finland are realized at Ekoviikki covering more than half of the buildings. Eight building integrated solar heating systems with a total area of 1,246 m2 produce 15 % of the total heating demand of the housing area and half of the DHW load in 400 apartments.
