Public awareness campaign on solar energy launched

To promote the technology of solar water heating in Albania, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Energy with the support of UNDP Climate Change Programme has recently launched a public awareness campaign on “Solar Energy: Clean and Renewable – Solar Water Heating: Environmental Friendly and Saving Technology”.
The campaign aims to increase awareness and understanding among local communities of the coastal area, about the feasibility of the solar water heating systems (SWH) as a technology contributing to energy saving and climate change mitigation.
The campaign also aims to facilitate access to information in order to gain public and private support for policy measures, adequate financing mechanism and qualitative products and services to increase the penetration of the solar water heating systems among the residential, service and industrial sectors in Albania, both, public and private ones.
The Campaign will take place over the next 2 weeks alongside the coastal cities from north to south of Albania.
During the launch event in Durres, a “Portable Solar Shower” was used for demonstration purposes. With the support of Albania solar manufacturers a trailer was equipped with two types of Solar Panels and one accumulator. The solar panels exposed to the sun during the day were connected to public showers in the beach and provided hot water for interested people together with information on the associated benefits of such systems especially at summer time.
Mr. Behar Zeneli, General Director of Policies for Natural Resources Development, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Energy during his speech at the event amongst others highlighted: ” In line with the aim and objectives of the Albanian government policy in the energy field, reflected in its programme and in the National Energy Strategy on the promotion of renewable energy sources, to enable the maximum explotation of the local resourses, I am pleased to participate today in the awareness campaing to promote solar water heating systems, organised by METE in the frame of the project for solar water heating, funded by the Global Environmental Facility and the Albanian government and implemented by UNDP as part of the Global Initiative for Market Transformation for Solar Water Heating”.
Mr. Freddy Austli, UNDP Deputy Country Director, who attended the event, amongst others highlighted: “The Solar Water Heating is one of the promising technologies to reduce the electricity and fuel wood consumption with a significant contribution towards the greenhouse gas emissions reduction”.
According to the National Energy Strategy, Albania’s National Communications to United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Technology Needs Assessment, over 70% of domestic hot water needs of the household and service sector in Albania is supplied by electric boilers, while the energy demand for hot water in Albania is projected to grow from 600 GWh in 2000 to 875 GWh in 2015, in the residential sector alone. Using solar water heating systems, one may save around 30% – 50% of the electricity used for sanitary hot water preparation. And for the service sectior and hotels, the bigger the hot water consumption, the more feasible is the substitution of the electric boilers with the solar water heaters. A well dimensioned solar water heater may cover up to 70% of the respective demand for hot water throughout the year.
The challenge is to (i) enabling legal and regulatory framework to promote sustainable SWH market; (ii) enhance awareness and capacity of the targeted end-users and building professionals to consider and integrate SWH systems into different types of buildings; (iii) increase demand for SWH systems by the availability of attractive end-user financing mechanisms; (iv) develop and implement a certification and quality control scheme applicable for Albanian conditions and (v) enhance capacity of the supply chain to offer products and services promoting sustainable SWH market.
The Albanian Government with the support of UNDP through the Global Environment Facility and UNEP is implementing a project which facilitates the installation of 75,000 m2 of new installed collector area over the duration of the project, an annual sale of 20,000 m2 reached by the end of the project and with expected continuing growth to reach the set target of 520,000 m2 of total installed SWH capacity by 2020.
The project also aims to accelerate a sustainable market development of solar water heating in Albania with good quality products and services. Under the estimated business as usual scenario, 184,000 m2 of new solar thermal panels would be installed in Albania by 2020, while in the alternative scenario, new solar thermal installations of 520,000m2 are expected by 2020. The greenhouse gas emissions reduction resulting from this alternative scenario has been estimated at 146,000 tons of CO2 per year in 2020 or at the cumulative amount of over 800,000 tons of CO2 by 2020.