WE’RE SAVING MONEY AND ENERGY

OBRAD TADIĆ, CEO AT SMART ENERGY INVESTMENT KFT, SEI BEOGRAD BRANCH

Since the launch of its operations in Serbia, one of the main goals of the SEI Beograd branch of company Smart Energy Investment Kft has been to reduce energy consumption and harmful emissions through the reconstruction of public lighting

Around 15 million euros has been invested in the implementation of our projects in Serbia to date, with all funds coming from our own or commercial sources”, notes Smart Enenrgy Investment Kft CEO Obrad Tadić.

Are the people aware of how negatively the use and production of energy impacts on the environment? How can we learn to use energy efficiently?

We are aware of the negative impact of energy exploitation, but on the other hand we mustn’t overlook the positive effects of energy. We consider the emergence of fire as one of mankind’s most significant advances. The most important thing is to strike a balance between energy exploitation and the health of humans and the environment. This is a challenge that we must not fail to address. We must first dispel the notion that the problem of “energy & pollution” is something we can’t influence and that all our individual efforts are insufficient. Since the launch of our operations in Serbia, one of our main goals has been to reduce energy consumption and emissions of harmful substances through the reconstruction of public lighting. We were assured that this didn’t make sense, asked whether we are “aware of how negligible that is compared to the overall consumption of electricity, i.e. coal production in Serbia?” That didn’t stop us, as we believed that our projects could achieve energy savings of more than 75%, and that’s how we created our slogan “LET’S /SEIυ/ TOGETHER”, in which we intentionally equate the acronym of our company name (SEI) with the word “save”. So, our advice is “LET’S /SEIυ/ TOGETHER”!

One of our main goals is to reduce energy consumption and emissions of harmful substances through the reconstruction of public lighting

Which projects is SEI currently involved in? Do you think an effective and affordable solution exists to the problem of air pollution?

The implementation of a project in Zaječar, which we are implementing successfully with Slovenian partner company Petrol, is currently underway. We are participating successfully in 13 projects in Serbia, because the contracts are long-term and we conduct maintenance on them, guaranteeing the realising of savings, quality and precision. We are witnessing the advance of technology and its possibilities, though I believe that no final solution exists beyond each of us individually. The solution must be within us and must start from us.

You’ve had precious assistance from Hungarian funds that donated projects to you. Can you tell us more about that?

We are currently preparing a study on the reconstruction of the public lighting system in Valjevo, for which we secured the City of Valjevo with around €87,000 from the Government of Hungary, or from its Western Balkan Fund, and we want to use that to promote energy efficiency and cooperation between Hungary and Serbia. Hungary supports economic cooperation and also invests huge resources through the Hungarian Export Promotion Agency (HEPA), which has its regional headquarters in Belgrade, while Hungarian diplomacy, led by H.E. Ambassador Pinter, is doing a great job.

How do your projects look in figures? This relates to millions of saved kilowatts of electricity and reductions of hundreds of thousands of tons in CO 2 production.

The quality of lighting is about 200% better, energy savings exceed 80%, while CO2 emissions have been reduced by about 155,000 tons, or about 14,000 tons of CO2 annually. If we consider that a single hectare of forest that has reached maturity (about 40 years old) absorbs 180 tons of CO2 per year, it is not difficult to calculate that “LET’S / SEIυ/ TOGETHER” is the right way.