Posted on 20 Apr 2012
Ruukki has signed a contract worth around EUR 2 million for the delivery of the steel frame and envelope structures for a combined heat and power (CHP) plant to be built in Jelgava, Latvia. Ruukki is responsible for the manufacture and installation of the frame structures and for the design, manufacture and installation of the envelope structures. Ruukki's customer is Metso Corporation, which is delivering the CHP plant to Fortum Jelgava SIA. When completed in 2013, the plant will generate heat for the Jelgava district heat system and electricity for the Latvian grid. The CHP plant has been designed by Metso and will be fired by biofuel, partly by peat and some recycled wood, and will replace the natural gas used at the existing plant. Fortum has invested in renewable energy production with a high power-to-heat ratio in its new CHP plants. The Jelgava plant will be the first biofuel-fired plant on this scale in Latvia and will have an annual production of some 230 GWh of heat and around 110 GWh of electricity. "Ruukki has focused strongly on developing competitive frame and envelope structure solutions. In recent years, we have had numerous successful major power plant projects in a number of market areas including the Nordic countries, Poland and the Baltic states. Energy production is an important customer segment for us and will become an increasingly more important focus area in the future," says Sami Eronen, SVP, Building Projects, at Ruukki Construction. European Union member states are required to provide 20 per cent of total energy consumption from renewable energy sources by 2020. Thanks largely to hydropower, Latvia's share of renewable energy already ranks among the highest in the EU. Latvia's national target is to increase the share of renewable energy sources to 42 per cent by 2020. Ruukki will begin manufacturing the structures this spring and installation work is scheduled for completion in early 2013. The structures will be manufactured by Ruukki's plants in Finland, Poland and Lithuania
