A Bilateral Forum on Sustainable Energy was organized as part of the state visit of the King of Netherlands, Willem-Alexander to Lithuania. The delegation from the Netherlands was received by President of the Republic of Lithuania, Dalia Grybauskaite.
Remigijus Lapinskas, President of the World Bioenergy Association (WBA) and a Lithuanian national was part of the event and presented the latest information about bioenergy developments globally and initiated discussions with bioenergy industries and institutions from Lithuania and the Netherlands on the possible collaboration with WBA.
The event focused on clean energy technologies and both the countries agreed that renewable energy technologies such as solar, wind, biomass, hydro and geothermal are playing an important role and will be important for future energy scenarios. The event was also an opportunity for Lithuania to showcase the development of the bioenergy sector and its contribution to the rest of the world. Key findings and outcomes of the event included:
- Bioenergy can and should be developed not only as a bilateral cooperation between the Netherlands and Lithuania but as a regional cooperation including all the Baltic States.
- Biomass from Lithuania meets the sustainability requirements set in the new EU Renewable Energy Directive including the legality of harvesting, forest regeneration, nature conservation areas, maintenance of soil quality and biodiversity
- It is already economically feasible to upgrade and process biomass to export from Lithuania to the Netherlands
- A Lithuania – Dutch cooperation in the bioenergy sector can and will bring development in R&D, agriculture, forestry, industry and allied services
- The existing culture and technological development of biomass mobilization in the country will form the basis of such cooperation
