Problems of Supplying Heat and Power to Cities and Towns of Siberia Were Discussed at the Coordination Council
The Novosibirsk Expocentre hosted a session of the Coordination Council on the Problems of Energy Supply in Siberia organized by the Interregional Association ‘Siberian Agreement’ and the Working Group for Providing Stable and Reliable Heat and Power Supply to Regions of Siberia formed by the Envoy of the Russian Federation President in the Siberian Federal District.
Participants of the Council expressed great concern over technical condition and wear of power equipment. Wear indicator reaches 70% in almost every region.
Deputy President of the Siberian Department of the Russian Federal Service for Ecological, Technical and Atomic Supervision (Rostekhnadzor) Victor Shabalin pointed out the main reasons of this situation, which was discovered in the process of unplanned inspections conducted at the time of preparing for the 2013-2014 winter heating season. The list of reasons includes, first of all, lack of well-trained personnel, insufficient amount of necessary equipment, unsatisfactory condition of boiler buildings, failures to observe the work schedule of preparation for the winter period, absence of emergency heating supply equipment, and insufficient amount of fuel.
‘All this may lead to emergency shutdowns of industrial facilities and limited heat and power supply to production enterprises, socially important institutions and housing and utility facilities during the heating period’, - said Victor Shabalin.
President of the Zabaikaliye Department of Rostekhnadzor Alexander Volkov drew the participants’ attention to one more problem related to supplying heat to military towns:
‘OJSC ‘Repair and Maintenance Directorate’ is currently the only heat supplier of the Russian Federation Ministry of Defense and its subsidiary organizations’.
‘This enterprise does not technically meet the requirements set for energy companies or the facilities that are subject to decrees issued by the entities of the Russian Federation. It means that the enterprise that has 3.5 thousand employees only in the Zabaikaliye Region and oversees over 200 heat supply facilities as well as various social organizations cannot be inspected by the relevant controlling authorities to check its preparedness for the winter season’, - noted Alexander Volkov. – ‘The preparedness of property management facilities to the heating season, which started on September 15th – 25th, is 10 to 15%. The situation is the same every year. The company management doesn’t seem to feel responsible for that’.
Similar problems were voiced by the officials from other regions of the Siberian Federal District. The Krasnoyarsk Region Minister of Energy and Housing Sector Andrey Reznikov added that according to the Russian Law regional authorities have no right to provide help for the facilities of the Ministry of Defense.
‘It is clear that we won’t simply abandon this problem, we will continue our work on solving it. But we should work out a system-based approach, apply directly to the Ministry of Defense’, - Andrey Reznikov said.
President of the Coordination Council on Siberian Energy Vladimir Psarev suggested including the discussed proposals into the draft resolution drawn up based on the results of the session, and providing relevant recommendations for federal state authorities.
