On Monday 19 September, the European Commission authorised the granting of €150 million in public aid for the construction of a high-yield combined heat and power plant in Vilnius, Lithuania.
The plan, which will be partly funded by the Juncker investment plan, will produce electricity for Lithuania's national electricity grid and heat for the Vilnius district heating network. The powerplant will be made up of two units: one will run on non-recyclable municipal waste, the other on biomass.
According to the Commission, the Lithuanian plan complies with the 2014 guidelines regarding state aid for the protection of the environment and energy (see EUROPE 11057). It will help to achieve energy savings of around 40% and the state aid granted complies with the maximum authorised intensity for this type of investment. Furthermore, Lithuania has demonstrated that the plan would not have been sufficiently profitable to have gone ahead without the aid, the Commission states in a press release. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)