Efficiency boost – EUR 3 million for district heating system

The Ministry of Mining and Energy signed a contract with companies which will reconstruct the district heating system in the central Serbian town of Trstenik, seat of its own municipality. The project is financed with EUR 1.7 million by German KfW Development Bank, while the local authority said in a press release that it had already invested EUR 1.3 million, and that the town shall enter the next heating season with an energy efficient system, the most advanced in Serbia.

Miloš Banjac, assistant minister, stated that Trstenik, located in central part of the country, got more grants than any other town in the project for systematic overhaul of district heating. “What separates Trstenik from other participants in the programme is above all good management and a good project, given to the ministry several years ago, which KfW’s consultants rated as the one with the most potential for savings,” he explained.

For several decades, users didn’t get adequate service because of an obsolete and inefficient heating system, said Miroslav Aleksić, the municipality head. The Energetika public enterprise operated with losses and the local budget was very strained, so now efforts are made to introduce a new concept and new boilers on natural gas were constructed, he added. Next phase is the reconstruction of the distribution system and substations installment.