TOWARDS A DICHOTOMY OF THE ENERGY SECTOR IN FINLAND?

This article summarises the results from four studies on the potential of renewable energy sources (RES) and one study on the economic feasibility of distributed renewable energy production, in Finland. A major part of Finnish rural areas could be self-sufficient in energy production. The theoretical energy content consists of logging residues, straw, reed canary grass (potential on fallowed grounds) and digestible biomass resources (slurry from domestic animals, bio waste and sludge from water purification plants etc.). It covers both electricity and heat demand in all regions from the periphery to population centres up to 50-100 000 inhabitants, even though solar, wind and geothermal energy, other wood than logging residues, other cultivated bio energy sources than above, have not been included. This means that the real potential would be significantly larger. Small and medium sized distributed renewable energy production units can already now be economically feasible. In the economy there are, however, severa