At its meeting of September 6 the Ministry of Economics presented to the government its information report “Short-term energy consumption reduction measures planned by the state agency and targets for energy savings in the heating season 2022/2023”. The informative report also includes the “Guidelines for measures for reduction of short- and long-term energy consumption in state agencies and capital companies” developed by the Elektrum Energy Efficiency Centre.
The informative report summarises the information provided by all sectoral ministries regarding the energy consumption reduction measures for their agencies, including capital companies, that have been planned and have to be performed during the heating season 2022-2023, and includes examples of good practice. Similarly, taking into account all the amount of energy consumption estimated by the state agency, the informative report sets short-term targets for reducing energy consumption for the heating season 2022-2023, which is usually October-April, as well as obliges the State Chancellery and ministries to provide information to the Ministry of Economics regarding energy consumption in the heating season 2022-2023 by 1 June 2023, while the Ministry of Economics is required to evaluate whether the target set in the informative report has been achieved.
Reducing energy use should become a paradigm of our daily thinking – everyone of us must change our daily habits to use resources more efficiently and consequently save own financial resources. Meanwhile, sectoral ministries, public institutions and capital companies and their employees are urged to lead the way in taking action and planning measures to reduce energy consumption also for a longer period of time, because only in this way we will be able to ensure improvement of energy efficiency of the public sector, energy independence and security, as well as reduction or no significant increase in energy consumption costs,” the Minister of Economics Ilze Indriksone says.
To reduce the consumption of heating energy, public authorities are planning to reduce heating temperature both during working hours (1-2 degrees) and outside working hours, as well as in all common use, non-office and technical premises and buildings, as well as to disconnect hot water supply in the premises and buildings where it is possible. It is also planned to implement several measures with long-term effects for controlling and monitoring heating energy, such as installing heat consumption regulation equipment (thermoregulators) or replacing them with newer and more efficient ones. It is also planned to implement long-term measures that will ensure immediate energy savings and prevent an increase of energy consumption, for example, renovation of buildings, replacement and improvement of heating systems of buildings, and switching from less efficient heating technologies to new and energy-efficient technologies. To reduce heating energy losses, it is planned to prevent the outflow of hot air (insulation of windows, reduction of opening of wind porches, doors, etc.), control ventilation of premises, etc.
In reducing electricity consumption, a big emphasis is planned to be placed on optimising lighting indoors – installation of LED/smart lighting, introduction of motion sensors, controlled switch off of lighting after working hours, as well as indoors – no or significantly reduced building facade lighting, significant reduction in parking and other outdoor lighting. It is also planned to introduce control of the use of machinery (office equipment, other equipment used) – automatic shutdown of equipment after the end of working hours, shutdown of equipment if it is not used for a longer period of time. There are also intentions to monitor more closely the use of electricity in heating of premises, the use of air conditioners and heaters. There are authorities that will install or are planning to install solar power generation equipment. It is also proposed to significantly reduce the use of lifts, where lifts could only be used to move cargo or persons with reduced mobility.
The anticipated measures to reduce natural gas consumption are similar to those to reduce heating energy consumption. In some institutions it is planned to change individual gas heating equipment to solid biomass fuel equipment or heat pumps, or to connect to the district heating system.
To reduce the consumption of petroleum products (transport fuel), it is mainly planned to reduce the use of service vehicles by planning routes, using ridesharing, replacing face-to-face meetings with remote meetings, more careful monitoring of fuel consumption. Some institutions are planning to purchase public transport tickets or pay for the rental of micro-mobility vehicles.
One of the most frequently mentioned measures to reduce energy consumption should be to inform employees about the correct use of energy, correct ventilation of premises while regulating the supply of heating energy to the premises. Several institutions are also planning to appoint special employees to constantly control the use of heating energy/heating and electricity.
At the same time, it is important to emphasise that for the selection and implementation of measures to reduce energy consumption it is essential to start recording and controlling energy consumption in detail from the beginning, as well as to identify the largest energy consumers and most energy efficient activities. Unfortunately, some authorities do not have information on the consumption of heating energy or electricity because premises are leased from another natural or legal person, where the bills issued do not contain information on the energy consumed, but the fees are charged on the basis of the areas leased. In such a case, the public authority has almost no chance to influence the total consumption of heating energy and electricity in the building and to take measures to reduce energy consumption. Similarly, most institutions do not carry out automated monitoring or registration of energy consumption, making it difficult for institutions to manually collect energy consumption data for specific months within such a short period of time.
The government generally instructed ministries to reduce the consumption of heating energy, electricity, petroleum products and natural gas from 1 October 2022 to 30 April 2023 by the following amounts indicated in the informative report:
- heating energy – by 9.7% compared to the average indicator of the previous three heating seasons;
- electricity – by 4.2% compared to the average indicator of the previous three heating seasons;
- petroleum products (fuel) – by 1.8% compared to the average indicator of the previous three heating seasons;
- natural gas – by 3.3% compared to the average indicator of the previous three heating seasons.
The government also instructed all sectoral ministries and state joint stock company VAS “Valsts nekustamie īpašumi” to introduce energy management systems at the level of departments of sectoral ministries by 31 December 2023 to ensure efficient monitoring and registration of energy consumption, including in the energy management system also subordinate institutions and capital companies of sectoral ministries;
The Ministry of Economics has been instructed to develop by 1 August 2023, in cooperation with sectoral ministries, a list of buildings of agencies of sectoral ministries, which should include the buildings owned or possessed by sectoral ministries, their subordinate institutions and capital companies, and the building owned or possessed by private persons or legal persons, which house agencies or capital companies of sectoral ministries.
The government also instructed all sectoral ministries to submit to the Ministry of Economics by 1 June 2023 the following information regarding their agencies (ministries, subordinate institutions, capital companies):
- data regarding the amounts of heating energy, electricity, transport fuel used in transport and natural gas used during the heating season 2022-2023 (October-April), or the area for which payments for energy have been made, if payments for energy consumption are not made for the amount of energy consumed and for the costs of heating energy, electricity, transport fuel and natural gas used;
- collect information regarding measures taken to reduce consumption of heating energy, electricity, transport fuel and natural gas;
- information regarding those measures, the implementation of which is planned to continue after the heating season of 2022-2023.
The Ministry of Economics, on the other hand, has been instructed to prepare by 1 August 2023 a summary of the information submitted by the abovementioned sectoral ministries and to submit to the Cabinet of Ministers a report on the results of the implementation of measures for reduction of energy consumption in the heating season 2022-2023.