Lithuania. Vilnius City Government

Date of loan: 16 September 2010
Country: Lithuania
Borrower: Vilnius City Government
NACE sector/loan type: Construction; Sewage and refuse disposal, sanitation and similar activities.

Focus sectors

Project

The 20-year-maturity loan totalling EUR 20 million has been provided for the construction of the city's western bypass road and sludge treatment plant as well as the renovation of schools as part of the city's investment programme for 2010.

The Vilnius 9-kilometre four-lane western bypass road is part of the IX Trans-European transport corridor connecting Vilnius and Riga, the capital of Latvia. The westbound motorway is one key to integrating the city's transport system into a broader transport network at the national and the Baltic regional levels.

The sludge treatment project is being implemented by the water utility company Vilniaus vandenys. The scope of the project includes the treatment of sludge and the utilisation of the produced biogas in a combined heat and power station. These measures would help reduce the quantity of the sludge by more than 50%, solve the problem of bad odour and obtain additional resources for producing electricity or heating.

The energy efficiency project comprises the renovation of 19 schools. The project would help save about 0.1 MWh per square metre.

Environmental summary

The project of building a new bypass road can be performed in accordance with the Bank's environmental policy and guidelines. The main environmental advantage is the transfer of traffic from the city centre to the new bypass. This will result in some reductions of air emissions. The building of the new bypass road also has some negative aspects, in respect to building a new stretch of road in a city environment.

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