Prospects of regional wind power development

Integration in to EU and market economy creates favourable possibilities to diversify national energy sector and largely use of prospective, most rapid developing in the world wind energy. Made researches of wind power enabled to provide favourable regional character of this energy branch. On the ground of analysis of energy sources, legislative and economic environment in the article were formulated and fore grounded strategic scenarios of Lithuanian wind energy development

Šilumos ūkio problemų analizė šalies regionuose

District heating (DH) companies deal with serious economic-financial problems during the transition period towards market economics. The paper investigates economic-financial situation of DH companies. Significant difference between heat tariffs and production costs, huge commercial heat supply losses has been identified with the help of simulation mathematical model. All this causes damage for the sustainable energy development. The mathematical model of the heat sector is based on the establishment of info system of the energy sector and may be used as a tool for the assessment and revision of a state policy

Influence of price regulation to the efficiency of district heating companies

The paper investigates the influence of price regulation to the efficiency of district heating companies. The regulation of energy prices in Lithuania is performed on the principles of recognizing justified costs and controlling the profit rate. Though Lithuania's economics is pacing fast towards the market development, the state's regulation and control of prices is still powerful in the energy sector. For district heating sector such regulation does not preserve DH companies from constantly growing debts that are the main barrier for the renovation of the existing heat supply infrastructure, the implementation of new technologies and a wider use of the renewable energy resources. The main reasons of unfavourable financial situation in DH companies are decreasing sales and inadequate regulation of heat tariffs, so often based on political reasons. This paper proves that in order to preserve economically based extension of district heating infrastructure, the following factors should be included in the fuel and natural gas pricing techniques, as one of the main issues of long-term energy strategy: comparativeness of prices for energy resources and competition between energy sectors. As there are no possibilities to increase fast the heat tariff, the thermal economy can be led out of financial crisis only after having recognized accumulated longterm debts as a state debt, or there should be applied other forms of state support