Upper Austria shows way to greener future

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Sun, Aug 3 11:24 AM
Salzburg, Aug 3 (IANS) The European Union has a 20-20-20 target tobe achieved by 2020: cutting greenhouse gas emissions 20 percent,reducing energy consumption 20 percent by increasing efficiency andincreasing the share of renewable energies to 20 percent. How isthis to be achieved? The state of Upper Austria has the answer.
It's a combination of encouraging renewable energy use village byvillage and home by home, plus showing builders how more energyefficient buildings could increase their profits - all backed by aslew of laws and directives, explained Christiane Egger, deputymanager of the Upper Austrian Renewable Energy Agency.
Addressing delegates from around the world at a Salzburg GlobalSeminar session on Combating Climate Change at Local and RegionalLevels: Sustainable Strategies, Renewable Energy, Egger saidrenewable sources already provided 30.9 percent of gross energyconsumption in Upper Austria - 14.6 percent from hydro power and12.6 percent from biomass forming the bulk.
IANS was the only media outlet from Asia invited to the seminar.
Upper Austria is a region of rolling farmlands and forests, all inprivate hands. The farmers who own the forests now do theircyclical logging and sell the wood to biomass heaters andelectricity generators rather than to paper mills, and make moremoney in the process.
It is not a model that can be replicated in developing countries,especially those in the tropics, where the government owns almostall the forests and deforestation is the big problem. But where itworks, it works very well.
Egger took the delegates to the village of Neukirchen to show how.The farmers have formed a cooperative, to which individuals who ownforests sell their woodchips. The cooperative has installed aheater that burns these woodchips and provides heating to theentire village, an essential requirement in an area that is undersnow for almost half the year.
Heinrich Schausberger runs his own biogas plant at the other end ofthe village. Nothing new about that, except that the 250 kw ofpower the plant generates is sold back to the electricity grid, ata guaranteed rate of 14.9 cents per kw for the first 13 years ofthe deal.
It is this feed-in tariff that has given the real boost todecentralised renewable energy generation in many parts of Europe.Schausberger buys 6,600 cubic metres of raw material a day - cornstalks, switchgrass, wintergrass and manure. He maintains a largebiogas plant that can store 250 cubic metres of gas at a timebefore they are used to run a combined heat and power (CHP) engine.Not surprisingly, he makes a tidy profit.
Decentralised generation and the use and sale of renewable energyform one part of the Upper Austria success story. The other isenergy efficiency, in which building insulation plays a vital role.
Egger's organisation has focussed strategies for this. Forsingle-family homes, it provides advice and financial support. Formulti-family homes, it holds demonstrations and financial supportagain. For private office buildings, it provides specific ideastoo. For public buildings, it has made laws and it holdscompetitions among architects to design the most energy-efficientof them all.
'By changing how people think and how they behave, we can changehow they invest in sustainable buildings,' Egger says. The resultis that 95 percent of all new homes and 80 percent of all homes inthe region are now low-energy consumers.
The new buildings do more, by generating their own solar power andselling whatever they do not need.
Egger listed the benefits for the state:
* Lower energy imports are saving two billion euros a year.
* The boost to renewable energy generation is creating 25,000 newjobs in Austria.
* It has led to an additional investment of over 100 million eurosin the state of Upper Austria.
* Export opportunities in the area of renewable energy have risenmore than 50 percent.
* There are 110 research and development projects in the area goingon right now, and more than 500 teachers and students in this newfield.