Cogeneration
Finland is the leading country in the world in combined heat and power (CHP)
generation. Almost 80 per cent of district heat production is based on CHP
generation. Correspondingly, one-third of electricity is obtained from
cogeneration. No other country has such a great market share of CHP electricity
than Finland. In the EU, combined heat and power generation amounts to
only nine per cent of total electricity production.
The target of the Kyoto Climate Protocol is a global agreement aiming at the
reduction of greenhouse gases. Due to these obligations, North American and
Asian countries in addition to the European Union have started to take interest
in CHP production. The EU itself is active, and it has set its own target
of doubling the share of cogeneration by 2010. Therefore, CHP generation is
regarded in the EU as the most significant individual method to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions. In Finland, the significance of CHP production is
increasing even further.