Sustainable Energy in
Šilutė Municipality

General view of Šilutė from plane “Šarka” guided by radiowaves. Photographer: © Kęstutis Fedirka

Šilutė Municipality is in the lowest part of Lithuania, bordered by Curonian Split of the Baltic Sea and Nemunas – the largest river in Lithuania, which actually has its delta in the municipality. Largest forests of the region include also ichtiological reservation.

54.7 percent of the region is agriculture area, 18.84% forests; 16.4% waters and the rest are the town area, industries, ways and others.

Significant area of the region is covered by Nemunas floods every year, thus isolating part of area and disconnecting land transport to some settlements.

Industry: Food/beverages; bioethanol; wood processing; furniture, textile.

Agriculture: Though high share of agriculture land – low productivity index. Due to floods most of it is used as pastures and water grasslands.

Climate: mild, marine.

Šilutė Municipality energy system consists of:

• district heating supply and decentralized heating;
• regional electricity supply system via national grid;
• distributed electricity generation by RES producers;
• no natural gas networks.

Activities are planned in the following areas:

• Reduction of CO₂ emissions by 20% by 2020 under obligations to the Covenant of Mayors,
• Establishment of favorable legislation for enabling implementation of obligations;
• Improvement of financing tools;
• Wide use of RES;
• Modernization of district heating sector;
• Improvement of energy efficiency in buildings via renovation of block residential houses;
• Improvement of public transport sector and use of biofuel;
• Development of bicycle paths;
• Development of urban green areas;
• Participation in international programs and sharing of experience;
• Implementation of “clean technologies“;
• Public information and awareness raising;
• Implementation of environment management systems.

SEAP was produced in 2010 by municipal Environment officer, however, due to lack of experience and data on municipal energy sector SEAP needs significant revising. Actually it is more the list of SEPs to be implemented till 2020 rather than a full Action Plan.

LEI (project partner for the ENNEREG Pioneer Region Kaunas County) made obligations to update the plan, including production of explanatory Memo, including current situation of energy sector, explanation of strategic guidelines and good practice examples in Lithuanian language under ENNEREG.

LEI has also made obligations to arrange one seminar on Energy Efficiency after presentation of revised action plan.

The Municipality consists of 1 city centre - Šilute - and 7 minor settlements, thus there are no separate SEAPs.

Interaction with other initiatives at the Regional, National or European level:

• Covenant of Mayors signed on February 10, 2009;
• Participating in Euroregion “Baltics” (Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Denmark, Sweden) established on Feb. 22, 1998;
• Participated in Central Peripheral Maritime Regions (Sweden, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania) in the project “Baltic Sea PLANET”.