Energy, Investments, Latvia

International Internet Magazine. Baltic States news & analytics Friday, 29.03.2024, 12:10

LVL 6 million to be invested in biogas production plant in Latvia’s town Vainode

Alla Petrova, BC, Riga, 12.08.2008.Print version
Entrepreneur Andris Grigis plans to invest LVL 6 million in development of a biogas production plant in Vainode (south-western Latvia), as the newspaper Dienas Bizness informs today.

Andris Grigis.

The planned biogas production plant will operate in a combined heat and power generation regime with two megawatt capacity. Biogas will be produced from two materials – maize silage and pig dung, from the pig farm in Vainode, owned by GDG holdings. GDG holdings has completed the preliminary examination of the project and has started soil preparation in 1000 hectares of farmland for corn sowing. At the same time the company is drawing up a project application for attracting European Union funding, Grigis informed.

 

"Biogas production plant is a perfect option for enterprises in the unstable economic circumstances. The first biogas at the plant is planned to be obtained at around November 2009. Altogether the plant will have the capacity to process 30,000 to 40,000 tons of dungwash, thus it will produce around 6 million cubic meters of biogas per year. The investments could pay back in six to seven years time, Grigis estimates.

 

Precise estimates could become known in approximately one and a half years time, when the project will have started full scale operations.

 

"Initially, we planned to develop the biogas plant with support from the state as a pilot project in Latvia – to build a full production cycle site, where each Latvian farmer could gain practical knowledge about this type of energy production, which is very advantageous for the agriculture. We intended to organize a number of seminars and lectures for farmers. However, we did not receive support from the government, therefore we are carrying out the project on our own initiative," Grigis said.

 

Although biogas production is already widespread in Europe, it is not popular in Latvia, mainly – due to the farmers' lack of knowledge, the entrepreneur believes.

 

"Thinking on a state level, the politicians should do everything to support such an energy production option. Besides the electricity and head produced, the biogas plant also gives access high quality natural soil fertilizers, obtained in the process of manure fermentation. It would allow to cut the use of chemical fertilizers by 50 to 70%," the entrepreneur underlines.






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