Finnish scientists saw the great future of Russia in the use of renewable energy

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    According to the forecast of specialists from the Lappeenranta University of Technology (Finland), in 15 years Russia has every chance to become a leader in the use of renewable energy in the Eurasian continent. According to scientists, building a system in Eurasia that uses 100% clean energy will cost about half the price of building the right amount of nuclear power plants of similar total capacity.

    According to experts, the most effective system will be when combining as many regions of Eurasia as possible into a single energy system. The more power grids are combined into one “supernet”, the less will be the need for buffer devices designed to accumulate and store excess energy. In addition, the calculations for the model were made on the assumption that instead of using natural gas, enterprises will switch to gas produced from electricity from renewable sources (for example, hydrogen produced from water).

    In studyWe considered the use of only that part of the energy that goes to receive electricity and for industrial purposes, and such things as heating and transport were not taken into account. The study was conducted to study the possibilities of using renewable energy sources on the Eurasian continent.

    “According to our data, this is the first model evaluating the characteristics of 100% renewable energy for Russia and Central Asia,” said Professor Christian Breyer, one of the authors of the work. “It follows from the model that Russia can become one of the most competitive regions in the world in the field of renewable energy.”

    The model built by scientists uses various sources of renewable energy. About 60% of all energy in it is produced due to wind, the remaining 40% is evenly distributed between solar energy, the use of biomass fuel and hydroelectric power plants. The total capacity of the energy system model is 550 GW.

    According to researchers, the capacity of the combined energy systems of Russia and Central Asia is 388 GW, of which only 1.5 GW (less than 0.4%) is the share of wind and solar energy. According to data from 2008, the total capacity that the energy systems of the CIS countries are capable of was in the region of 300 GW.

    According to scientists, in addition to reducing the total cost of the system compared with the use of nuclear power plants, the final cost of electricity will have to decrease by about 20%.

    At present, the basis of the Russian electric power industry is about 600 power plants with a total capacity of 210 GW operating as part of the UES of Russia. About 61% of the capacity is provided by thermal power plants, 21% - by hydroelectric power stations, 17% - by nuclear power plants. Less than 1% falls on experimental solar and wind power plants .

    Scientists from the University of Technology Lappeenranta have long been involved in the use of renewable energy. In 2012, the University, together with the Lappeenranta city administration, developed a concept by which small households will be able to transfer excess solar energy from their panels to a centralized city energy network.

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