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Start of geothermal heating plant in Torun, Poland expected for Sept. 2020

Start of geothermal heating plant in Torun, Poland expected for Sept. 2020 City center of Torún, Poland (source: flickr/ tomstravelscom, creative commons)
Alexander Richter 12 Aug 2020

The geothermal heating plant of Geotermia Torun in Torun, Poland is expected to start operations in September 2020. The plant has been developed by Lux Veritatis, a Catholic church-tied foundation in parts with funding by Polish national funds.

The heating plant, built on the initiative of Father Tadeusz Rydzyk, on which taxpayers spent at least tens of millions of zlotys, may start work already in September. Redemptorists would like it to supply warm brine not only to the radiators in their areas, but also to many other buildings in the western part of Toru?. Business can bring multi-million dollar profits.

The geothermal heating plant currently under construction in Torun, Poland could be starting in September – according to Piotr Dlugosz, chief designer of the Geotermia Torun heating plant, during the conference “The European Green Deal and Polish Interests”.

“In Torun, we are currently installing installations on two wells, but nothing stands in the way of drilling more and multiplying this heating plant. (…) It is a great wealth. The late minister professor Jan Szyszko has always promoted geothermal energy as our Polish source of energy.”

The well in the Torun Wood Port was drilled 12 years ago. In 2015, the monks received funding of PLN 26.5 million (EUR 6.2 million). Later, the state-owned PGE group took over the city’s heating tycoon, i.e. the French company EDF. Both the newly established company PGE Torun and the Redemptorists have been awarded multi-million subsidies for new investments related to heating.

PGE Torun has received PLN 18 million (EUR  4.2 million) in EU funding for three projects, thanks to which greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption are to decrease, and new heating networks and nodes will be built. On the other hand, the monks received PLN 19.5 million in subsidies for the construction of a geothermal heating plant in Torun, as well as PLN 12 million for projects related to the construction of a heating network to the Nicolaus Copernicus University and to residential buildings and educational facilities. The funding was reported by the National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management, which was supervised by the then Minister of the Environment, Jan Szyszko, who was a lecturer at the university founded by Father Rydzyk.

Lidia Kochanowicz-Mank, who is the financial director of the Lux Veritatis foundation, announced a year and a half ago that geothermal energy could start in January 2020. – Heating would go to the city, heat our temple, the College of Social and Media Culture (founded by Rydzyk – ed. ) and establishments behind the school and the museum – she said.

Source: Onet