Rolls Royce and Petrobaltic create a warm day in Hel

Polish oil and gas producer Petrobaltic and Britain's Rolls Royce opened a $41 million gas-fired utility yesterday, aiming to cut pollution in the tourist-favored Baltic coast region. "The plant will permit the reduction of harmful emissions by 130,000 tonnes a year," said Lech Kownacki, head of Energobaltic - a venture of state-owned Petrobaltic and Rolls Royce. A minority stake in Energobaltic is also held by private firm Hydromex. Kownacki said that the plant, which yesterday started to produce heat, will launch power production by the end of the year. The plant's installed electrical capacity will stand at 11 megawatts (MW) and heat capacity at 34 MW. The plant will use natural gas from a Petrobaltic-operated platform in the Baltic Sea to produce power and heat, mainly for the area around northern Wladyslawowo, which marks the beginning of the Hel peninsula. The utility will use 120,000 cubic meters of gas per day transported via an 82 kilometer undersea pipeline. Wladyslawowo - a town of 12,000 - sees its population jump fivefold every summer, when the coast is visited by both local and foreign, mostly German, tourists. (Reuters)