Serbia is a landlocked country in Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Plain and the Balkans.

Serbia is dependent on imports of crude oil and natural gas. Heat and power generation in Serbia is fundamentally based on the usage of fossil fuels in outdated and inefficient generation plants. Lignite dominates in power generation, while heavy and heating oil, natural gas and lignite dominate in the generation of district heating and industrial process heat.

District heating (DH) serves around 22% of residential customers and consumes 60% of national natural gas use. Municipal district heating companies with a combined capacity of 6,000 MW have high losses, due largely to equipment operating well below its design capacity and beyond its design life.

The consequences are high GHG emissions (Serbia emits approximately 62 million tons of CO2 annually), incompatible with commitments for European Union (EU) accession and Serbia’s Nationally-Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement. To meet EU accession requirements and to compensate for decreasing efficiency, Serbia must begin to replace its coal plants, beginning with 300 MW by 2023.

At the same time, Serbia also has a huge potential in renewable energy sources (RES), for the production of both heat and electricity. Additionally, energy efficiency (EE) measures are recognized as a new energy source, which potential should be incorporated together into the fuel switch process. Total technically usable potential of renewable energy sources is estimated to 5.65 Mtoe per year. Biomass has the highest potential for use in Serbia (3.448 Mtoe), followed by hydro power (1.679 Mtoe), solar energy (0.240 Mtoe), geothermal energy (0.180 Mtoe), and wind energy (0.103 Mtoe).

The Serbian government has recognized the renewable potential and set a goal for increasing the share of renewable energies in gross final energy consumption and improvement of energy efficiency in all sectors. Therefore, multiple laws and amendments in the field of energy and climate were adopted: the Law on the use of renewable energy sources, the Law on energy efficiency and rational use of energy, and the Law on climate change. The new legislative framework should enable increased usage of RES and implementation of EE measures, as well as contribute to climate change mitigation. After the adoption of the legislative framework, implementation of concrete measures within the country requires increased knowledge, and technical and management support.

Author: DanuP-2-Gas IPA PP1 - RDA Banat

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The Danube Region holds huge potential for sustainable generation and storage of renewable energy. However, to this date region is highly dependent on energy imports, while energy efficiency, diversity and renewables share are low. In line with the EU climate targets for 2030 and the targets of the European Strategy for the Danube Region, DanuP-2-Gas supports transnational energy planning by strengthening generation and storage strategies for renewables in the Danube Region via advanced sector coupling technologies.