The President of the Renewable Energy Group at the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Serbia (SCC), Mladen Stojadinovic, said today that biomass as an energy source in Serbia is still an untapped potential and that the authorities will be asked to introduce subsidies to buy boilers and burn biomass.
“We will propose to introduce subsidies for buyers of biomass boilers and stoves, such as EU countries and the environment, as this has contributed to a significant increase in the use of that energy. This would also significantly reduce air pollution”, Stojadinovic said on the Roundtable on energy measures needed to reduce air pollution, held at the SCC.
He added that rules for biomass standardization would also be proposed to enable biomass to be used in an energy efficient manner.
“Even the existing capacities are not adequately used”, he said, citing the example of Belgrade power plants, which were adapted by some boiler plants such as the one in Barajevo or Senjak for the use of biomass or pellets, but later used coal.
According to him, almost 400,000 tonnes of pellets were produced in Serbia last year, 25 percent of which were exported abroad.
Stojadinovic also pointed out that “resources and fast-growing plants” are totally unused in Serbia.
He believes that areas where land is not suitable for high yields should be planted with fast-growing plants, which are an excellent energy source.
He also estimated that state support could systematize the collection of wood residues from the forest, as well as harvesting residues from about two million hectares of arable land, which were not properly used and would also be a good energy source.
Professor at the Faculty of Forestry in Belgrade, Branko Glavonjic, pointed out that Serbia is currently the largest consumer of wood pellets and wood biomass in the Western Balkans region and emphasized that about 80 percent of the biomass potential is currently being used in the country.
He cited measures by the Serbian government, which halved the VAT rate on wood pellets, wood chips and other wood fuels from 20 to 10 percent, as one of the reasons.
“This has led to an increase in the consumption of these fuels and a decrease in their exports”, Glavonjic said, adding that it contributed to the improvement of air quality in Serbia.
He also appealed to 1.3 million households that use firewood to use dried and dry wood instead of raw wood.
As he explained, dry wood “heats much better and emits less harmful substances, primarily smoke and soot”, indicating that “individual fireboxes are a significant factor in air pollution”, Beta reports.
