Baltic States – CIS, Construction, Energy, Investments, Legislation, Lithuania

A total of LTL 58 million (EUR 16.8 million) was invested in the construction of the 50 MW biofuel plant, located in a site owned by the company Bionovus. The plant was later sold to a Dutch investment fund. It could be already supplying heat to Vilnius' residents, cutting their heating bills.

However, construction watchdogs decided that a peace agreement signed between the State Territorial Planning and Construction Inspectorate and the plant's builders has been breached as allegedly the sanitary zones around the plant have not yet been determined. This is the first case in Lithuania when a completely built and operational object is officially proposed to be demolished without a court's decision.

The Greens' MP Linas Balsys says that games of interest groups are damaging the vital needs of Lithuania. "It is very sad that the president's office has involved itself in this fight of interests too, and is supporting a company which is related to the Russian capital," Balsys said.

Member of the Seimas, Deputy Chairman of the Seimas' Economy Committee Arturas Skardzius claims that the decision to demolish the operational biofuel plant will cause both economic and political damage to Lithuania. "The Construction Inspectorate should find ways to solve the legal conflict, if any, in a peaceful manner. It is more than just a nonsense to destroy an object of such vital importance to the Lithuanian economy, it does look like sabotage," the MP said.

The state energy company Lietuvos Energija, meanwhile, has published a statement saying that a land site is available for rent to build a new cogeneration power plant in the zone where the plant, which the Construction Inspectorate wants to demolish, is located. Although the builder is unknown, one would not find it strange that the builder is the Finnish company Fortum which has been actively implementing energy projects in Russia and enjoying our president's support.

Fortum was also the company which benefited from the damaging of their rival Reenergy which wanted to build a waste incineration plant. In autumn of 2013, the Construction Inspectorate cancelled a permit for Reenergy to build the plant. These strange coincidences make one think that construction watchdogs might be blindly implementing a political order. One could only wonder where such orders come from – the Daukantas square in Vilnius (location of the presidential palace – ELTA) or the Kremlin in Moscow? Experts estimate that if the plant is indeed stopped, heat consumers will pay additional LTL 7.56 million (EUR 2.2 million) in a year for heat.