Energy Security for Slovakia - Energy policy based on renewables
1. Why the energy security must be the key political issue
From
the energy production and consumption point of view Slovakia is probably in the
most vulnerable position among the EU member states. Practically all oil and
gas and large amount of coal are imported from Russia. Especially the oil and
gas deliveries seem to be risky business for the future. Most EU countries
diversified their suppliers so that problems with one of them can be somehow
compensated by another one. Also the pipeline connections (interconnections
between MS) allow most of the EU MS to diversify their oil ad gas suppliers.
This is not the case of Slovakia - 98% of oil and 98 % of gas are flowing
through Ukraine - the rest is domestic production. Political contacts to Russia
were traditionally very good and deliveries were considered reliable. But the
recent politically and economically motivated problems between Russia and oil
and gas transit countries - Ukraine or Belorussia showed that Slovak energy
security became a hot issue for the government. Despite the fact that Slovakia
does have long term contracts with Russian suppliers of oil and gas, in case of
problems with transit countries the only solution would be to use stored oil
and gas and that is only short term measure.
Political
stability in Russia and good relationships between EU and Russia seems to be
crucial in securing the oil and gas deliveries. In the short term perspective
Russia needs EU maybe more than is the opposite because of huge revenues from
export to the EU and no possibility to substitute this dependency with other
export markets in the meantime. The situation is rapidly changing and Russia is
building its strategic partnership with China and other fast developing Asian
economies. Construction of new oil and gas pipelines between Russia and these -
from EU perspective competing markets - is from Russian perspective logical
step towards diversifying of their export markets. All this would not be a big
problem if there would be enough resources to cover ever increasing energy
consumption in China and other emerging economies building ties to Russia. But
this is not the case. In maximally five years time when the pipelines
especially to China will be developed and when production of Russian oil and
gas will culminate the situation for the most depending countries like Slovakia
will be critical.
Future energy
security must be seen also from the perspective of upcoming peak oil. Recent
Russian oil data show that the rate of export is slowing down where ever
increasing domestic consumption is playing big role. The tightness and future
problems with gas deliveries to Europe have been mention several times by
Russian experts. This new situation must be judged by the EU very seriously.
The MS (especially those first on the line) should be prepared for the worst
situation when Russian deliveries will be declining or maybe stopped for long
time e.g. from political reasons.
The key question
is: are we prepared for the worst case scenario? The answer at least for
Slovakia is no. INFORSE is trying to come up with the solution which can
partially overcome the problems (short term measures) and also with the
solution (long term measures) which can solve the problems with oil and gas for
ever.
2. Scenarios
Following
scenarios are dealing only with oil and gas shortages, provided that the
electricity production is primarily not depending on Russian resources.
Unfortunately nuclear fuel which provides 50 % of electricity (rest is hydro,
coal and natural gas) in Slovakia is also imported from Russia. Nevertheless,
for this case it is estimated that the nuclear fuel will not be an imminent
problem and that it can be substituted by other suppliers or even the electricity
can be imported from abroad.
On the other hand
natural gas used primarily for heating purposes and oil used for transportation
can not be substituted easily by other suppliers. Thus the scenarios are based
on finding alternatives to these fuels and contrary to the official -
alternatives based on renewables.
2.1. Scenario Nr. 1 : Natural Gas Problem
Situation
picture:
Priority
problem:
Heating buildings
and warm water preparation = 90% of natural gas consumed in Slovakia.
Solutions
and Renewable energy options:
Following
renewable energy sources can be used in Slovakia for heating and warm water
preparation:
1. Biomass
2. Solar energy
3. Geothermal (heat pumps)
Note:
Electricity produced from renewables and used for
electrical heating is not considered as the option because it is considered for
providing the energy for renewable energy heating facilities e.g. heat pumps.
Solutions:
Solutions can be defined for:
2.1.1.
Municipal level solutions:
Option
1: Biomass + Solar
Substitution
of natural gas firing boilers by the biomass burning boilers with solar
collectors used for water storage preheating.
Description: most of the recent
heating facilities also in bigger cities can be retrofitted for wood chips or
pellets burning. Technology for biomass burning is available. Problems with
covering large demand for the technology (new orders) in short period of time
will arise. Problems with biomass fuel can be solved from short term perspective
due to the large forest area (50% of Slovakia covered by forests). The amount
of biomass fuel needed will be reduced by the utilization of newly installed
solar collectors on the roofs of heating facilities with preheated warm water
storage.
Option
2: Geothermal
Substitution of
natural gas firing boilers by the geothermal heat or heat pumps utilisation.
Description: potential for
geothermal heating is available in large parts of Slovakia and has not been
used yet. Especially several smaller municipalities are the main target users.
Technology is available. Problem with growing electricity consumption, when
developed on large scale, needs to be addressed. Generally this option should
be accompanied by the large scale wind energy development which is not properly
used yet and which should cover all extra electricity needs mentioned here.
2.1.2.
Single family houses solutions:
Option
1: Biomass+Solar
Small biomass (wood logs) furnaces are just starting
to be discovered by the public. It is primarily the ever increasing natural gas
prices which forced the small users to cut off the natural gas pipelines
(district heating systems) and use own biomass small boilers. Technology is not
a problem and price is reasonable. No further incentives are needed especially
in rural areas where this development is going on even without external crisis.
Solar collectors - self building program: Due to the fact
that people especially in rural areas still prefer cheap and even
do-it-yourself solutions it would be appropriate to use solar collectors build
by the people themselves. Simple water heating solar collectors can be build cheaply, easily and quickly. The know-how and the
information to spread the message around is needed.
The equipment needed for construction can be borrowed and passed around the
groups of people participating at self building program.
2.1.3.
Industrial level solutions:
It is assumed that
during the crisis the industrial level of activity will be reduced so the need
for the fuel change and retrofitting of own heating facilities will be left
upon the decision of owners. Nevertheless solutions described above can be
applied in this sector as well.
2.2. Scenario Nr. 2 : Oil Problem
Situation
picture:
Priority
problem:
Providing
fuel for transportation.
Solutions
and Renewable energy options:
Following
renewable energy sources can be used in Slovakia for substitution of oil:
1. Biofuels
(biogas, biodiesel)
2. Wind, hydro and PV (electricity)
Solutions:
Solutions can be defined for:
Provided that key
transport services in case of emergency like medical, fire or police will
always be met by the government first and their share on total fuel consumption
is small.
2.2.1.
Public transportation:
Option
1: RE electricity
Slovakia has a
very good network of public transportation lines build during communist regime.
Unfortunately majority of vehicles (buses) are running on diesel fuel. The key
problem thus would be to shift passengers from busses to trolleybuses in cities
and to use rail for intercity travel.
Cities: new trolleys can
be built relatively easily, busses are already being
retrofitted to dual diesel/electricity use.
Intercity
travel (commuting): rail network should be further developed instead of
being reduced in the meantime. This solution should be supported anyway and
taking its historical development in account should not be the big problem for
developed country like Slovakia.
Option
2: Biofuels
Biofuels which can from
technical point of view easily substitute oil (ethanol, biodiesel)
are used in limited way by now. But their share is growing - all this as the
result of EU legislation.
Nevertheless
biogas (purified to clean methane gas) produced from organic waste is not used
at all in Slovakia and should have a priority here. Upgraded biogas has the
same properties as natural gas. Therefore it can be used with the same car
engines and vehicle configuration as natural gas. Retrofitting of diesel
powered busses to natural gas is being enforced by the municipalities in the
meantime. Biogas instead of natural gas (methane) should have the priority in
case of crisis situation. Beside biogas plants build at waste water treatment
facilities which are quite frequently used in Slovakia, the huge unused
potential does exists in industrial sewage treatment plants and agricultural farms
(manure).
Biodiesel in form of
domestically produced raw plant oil burned in retrofitted diesel engines busses
should be also supported.
2.2.2
Transportation of goods :
Rail should be the
primary way of goods transportation. Trucks should be either put on rail or
should be retrofitted to biofuels (biogas, biodiesel). Above mentioned Options Nr. 2 should be used
appropriately in this sector.
2.2.3
Private transportation:
Option
Nr. 1 Biofuels
Private
transportation and use of cars is growing in Slovakia. Recently used cars are
least prepared for retrofitting to alternative fuels. Nevertheless use of biofuels should be enforced. Two options are viable:
1. Biogas produced from
municipal waste. In several European cities (most successful project in
Goteborg) cars are running on biogas (methane after purification of biogas)
produced from organic waste. This solution is technologically viable and should
be promoted by the municipalities in connection with waste management.
2. Biodiesel
in form of raw plant oil used in retrofitted diesel engines. Raw plant oil has
the best input/output energy ratio and should have the priority over biodiesel produced by means of esterification (e.g. from rape seed). Import of biodiesel from developing countries should be forbidden
until environmental and social acceptance criteria in producer countries will
be met.
3.
Potential of RE Souces in Slovakia
Above mentioned
solutions to the crisis scenarios are based on technologies (available on the
market) which require considerable increase of utilization of renewable energy
sources in Slovakia. Key question is if this increase can be achieved in
reasonable period of time and if the potential of these sources can cover the
demand?
Despite the fact that
substituting of fossil fuels by renewables can be
linked to several specific difficulties like utilizing RE in big cities or
substituting natural gas in centralized heating systems this is considered to
be technical problem which can be solved when needed. Financial requirements
for RE technologies are sometimes higher than in case of cross-subsidised
fossil fuels and thus can create a limitation. Nevertheless for the purpose of
this study we estimated the potential of RE which are cost competitive on EU
market today (wind, biomass, hydro, geothermal, thermal solar).
Biomass can be utilised
in different ways. According to the domestic experience the heat production
seems to be the most cost effective at present. Nevertheless biogas utilisation
with combined heat and power production and biofuels
for transportation (biodiesel) are becoming more and
more competitive on Slovak market even without subsidies. All these
technologies are available in Slovakia and can be introduced in short period of
time. Energy plantation can also be considered because of relatively huge land
area available which is not supposed to be used for food production. According
to the government it will be reforested.
As the biomass resource we assume
waste wood, straw, manure from agricultural farms and a land area available for
energy plantation.
Wood and
straw potential can be estimated from recent numbers of wood and grain
production.
For the estimate of energy plantation we used Slovak experience with
experimental plantation of Salix viminalis. Weight
gain up to 15 t/ha/yr of dry matter can be expected (30 t/ha/yr fresh matter)
with the density 10 000 cuttings per ha.
Wood, straw and energy
plantation potential for Slovakia.
|
|
Mil. ton/yr. |
PJ/yr |
|
Fuel
wood + waste wood from forestry
(fresh) |
1,5 |
15,0 |
|
Straw
(1/3 out of 3 mil. tonnes of grain
production per year) |
1,0 |
14,2 |
|
Straw
from rape seed production (40.000 ha * 4
t/ha) dry |
0,16 |
2,9 |
|
Energy
plantation (400.000 ha) dry
matter of Salix viminalis |
6,0 |
135,0 |
|
TOTAL |
17,66 |
167,1 |
Energy content used for
this estimate:
fresh wood - 10 GJ/ton
dry wood – 15 GJ/ton
straw – 14,2 GJ/ton
rape seed straw - 18 GJ/t
Biogas
For the estimation of biogas potential we can use the numbers of animals
(cattle, pigs and poultry) and derive biogas production in m3. From this the
heat and power production can be estimated according to domestic experiences
with this technology.
Biogas potential for Slovakia.
|
Total stock |
Annual manure
production |
Annual electricity
production |
Annual heat
production |
|
|
Cattle (500 kg) |
1 mil. |
10 mil. Ton |
300 mil. KWh |
2 PJ |
|
Pigs (150 kg) |
2 mil. |
6 mil. Ton |
180 mil. kWh |
1,2 PJ |
|
Poultry |
12 mil. |
0,36 mil. Ton |
12 mil. kWh |
0,08 PJ |
|
TOTAL |
|
|
492 mil. kWh |
3,3 PJ |
Data are based on results from
biogas facility in Batka. Inputs for this facility
are following:
Average biogas production: 2587,5 m3/d
(63,5 % CH4)
Average power production: 4485,9 kWh/d
Average heat production: 29,1 GJ/d.
GEOTHERMAL ENERGY
Geothermal energy is
used in Slovakia for several decades. Present utilisation is around 1,2 PJ per year. Main use is for heating purposes (swimming
pools, agriculture). Just recently geothermal energy was introduced for heating
apartment houses and also for power production. The total potential for this
source is almost inexhaustible and theoretically could cover all our energy
needs. However for the purpose of this study only governmental estimate of
„practically available potential“ is used. According
to this source the utilisation of 22,68 PJ/yr. until
the year 2010 can be achieved. It should be noted that huge potential of
geothermal energy could be used by means of heat pumps.
Solar ENERGY
Solar energy can cover
all our energy needs. Utilisation of solar collectors and passive solar energy
use are the most cost effective ways and are becoming more and more popular in
Slovakia. These technologies can substitute huge part of our needs for heating
and warm water preparation. Despite some financial restrains today,
photovoltaic can also be considered as the important source of electricity in
the short term.
HEAT MARKET
Taking into account
average typical performance of solar collector for heat production of 350
kWh/yr/m2 or 1,26 GJ/yr/m2 we can estimate that using
10 m2 per person or utilising 50 mil. m2 of solar
collector area we can achieve the heat production of 63,0 PJ per year. Despite
the fact that such an area seems to be very large it should be noticed that for
the energy needs combination with e.g. heat pumps (geothermal energy) is also
available what can lead to the reduction of collector area. Nevertheless 10 m2
per person can be achieved by the utilisation of roofs of the recent buildings.
Constructing large solar collector fields for centralised heating systems could
be considered as an alternative to placing of collectors on roofs.
Photovoltaics
Electricity produced by photovoltaics is becoming widely accepted as the major
source of power in the future. Nevertheless here it is considered as the
additional source to the easy and fast achievable potential like wind and
biogas. It is assumed that price advantage of these sources will lead to the full
utilisation of their potential as estimated above. For the Slovak electricity
needs it is estimated that 15 TWh/year should be
covered by photovoltaics. Size of
100 mil. m2 seems to be sufficient for the
production of this amount of electricity. This PV area is based on the average
power production of typical PVs on the market today.
For the average solar irradiation in Slovakia a typical PV system can produce
150 kWh per year per m2.
Wind power is not
utilised in Slovakia yet. First larger wind mills - four 600 MW turbines are in
planning stage. This technology, which is already cost competitive in some EU
countries, is delayed in Slovakia mainly due to the low feed in tariffs. In
case that governmental policy will change we can estimate the wind potential
with the means of following methodology.
1.
Assessing
the land (square kilometres) available for wind turbines sitting. Only areas
with average annual wind speeds more than 5-5,5 metres
per second (m/sec) at a height of ten metres above ground are taken into
account. This average speed is recognised as feasible for the exploitation of
win energy at today’s generating costs.
2.
Estimating
the number of wind turbines per square kilometre.
3.
Multiplying
number of turbines by average annual power production. Power production by
average 600 kW turbine at 6m/sec average wind speed is
taken as 1 GWh/yr.
The total available land resource
for Slovakia was estimated by the ministry of economy at 257
km2 in 43
regions (wind velocity higher than 5 m/sec). It should be mentioned that
further improvements in the technology will extent the potential for utilising
wind speeds of less than 5 m/sec. and the potential area can be considerably
larger. Nevertheless for the purpose of this study 257 km2 were taken into
account. According to the sitting experience up to 25 turbines can be placed in
area of 1 km2. The distance from each other will be at least
200 meters.
Theoretical annual power production
from 25 turbines (600 MW each) or 1 km2 will be 25 GWh/year.
This gives the theoretical potential of 6,4 TWh/yr. for the whole potential area (257 km2).
Recent hydropower
production is around 3,8 TWh/yr
and can be increased considerably. According to the governmental estimate the
total potential for electricity production in hydro power plant is 6,61 TWh/year according to some other sources this could be up
to 7,38 TWh/yr. Despite the fact
that there will be hardly 100 % utilisation of this potential (in some
countries it is more than 90 %) we consider production of 6,61
TWh/yr. as the upper bound here.
Important feature of
Slovak hydropower production is its utilisation of large pump hydro power
plants. Their total capacity today represents 1015 MW and 600 MW is in
planning. Due to the excellent geographical conditions the potential for pump
hydro is much larger and according to the previous estimates it can reach up to
10.000 MW. This can be used in future as the important energy storage what is
of crucial importance if RE like PV or wind is to be used on broader
scale.
4. Conclusion
To summarise the potentials for renewables in
Slovakia we can conclude that wind, hydro, biomass, geothermal and solar energy
can cover all our energy needs in the in case of any disruptions of fossil fuel
deliveries in the future. It should be noticed that potentials of hydro and
biomass are suggested to be fully utilised (technical potential) and higher
gains most likely cannot be expected in the future. Potential for wind is based
on recent possibilities and future increase of power production is likely due
to the improvements in technology. Wind together with geothermal and solar
energy can easily produce more than what is estimated here.
Total
potential of RE in Slovakia.
|
Annual
power production in TWh |
Annual
heat production in PJ |
|
|
Wind |
6,4 |
|
|
Biomass : Wood, straw, energy plantation |
|
167,1 |
|
Biogas |
0,49 |
3,3 |
|
Geothermal |
|
22,7 |
|
Solar thermal |
|
63,0 |
|
PV |
15,0 |
|
|
Hydro |
6,61 |
|
|
RE Potential
- TOTAL |
28,5 |
256,1 |
|
Annual Slovak power consumption in 2005 |
28,3 |
|
|
Annual Slovak power consumption in 2005 |
|
252,2(*) |
(*) where industry share is
147,9 PJ
individual heating
(households) share - 62 PJ
centralised heating systems
share - 104,3 PJ