The Peterburi tee filling station will cover an area of 25,000 square metres, with 120 slow-fill stations and two fast-fill tankers. It will be the largest of its kind in the Baltics and Finland.
In March, Bioforce will start the construction of the second phase – 200 slow refuelling stations and two fast refuelling tankers on the 35 000 square metre site of the Kadaka Road compressed natural gas filling station. Together with the construction of the refuelling stations, the bus terminals of Tallinn City Transport will be renovated on both Peterburi Road and Kadaka Road, covering a total area of 170 000 m2.
“In the future, up to 400 gas buses will be able to refuel per day at the two new compressed natural gas filling stations, and the capacity of the filling stations can be increased further if necessary. The terminals will be connected to conventional natural gas and compressed natural gas will be compressed on site. The refuelling technology will be fully automated and will not require an operator on site,” explained Henry Uljas, Chairman of the Board of Bioforce Infra OÜ.
Bioforce Infra OÜ is investing €7.5 million in the construction of both filling stations. Including the fuel, the contract for the gas refuelling stations is worth around €80 million over 10 years, making it the largest gas contract in the public transport sector in Estonia.
The large-scale renewal includes the purchase of new buses as well as the construction of refuelling stations and the renovation of the bus terminal. “All current diesel buses are to be replaced with an environmentally friendly alternative, and in the next few years 350 new buses using biofuels will be on Tallinn’s streets, 100 of which will be on the road by the end of this year,” said Deniss Borodich, Member of the Management Board of Tallinn City Transport AS. “This is the biggest environmentally friendly innovation in Tallinn’s public transport in recent years. With the introduction of the new buses, the ecological footprint of Tallinn’s public transport on the urban environment will be reduced by about 25 000 tonnes per year,” Borodich added.
According to Deputy Mayor Andrei Novikov, the new buses will not only help to save the environment, but also to save costs. “Replacing diesel buses with gas buses will help reduce costs by about €5 million a year. Today, gas buses offer the best technology in terms of value for money. By upgrading the bus fleet, we will also save on repair and maintenance costs for old and worn-out infrastructure,” said Novikov.
Verston Ehitus is the main contractor for the construction of the bus terminals and filling stations at the 73 Peterburi Road site, which was commissioned by TLT. According to Erkko Saluste, a member of the company’s management board, Verston has always been oriented towards modern and environmentally sustainable solutions in its activities, which is why it is very interesting and a pleasure to work on this project as a builder.
“We will do our utmost to ensure that the buses running on gas are on the route on time,” assured Saluste.
The shelters, foundations, the necessary infrastructure and the technological part will be built by Bioforce OÜ on the order of Bioforce Infra OÜ, for whom Nordecon Betoon OÜ will carry out the general construction works.
Bioforce Infra OÜ, which is mainly Estonian capital based, has cutting-edge know-how and extensive previous experience in the construction of similar filling stations thanks to its cooperation with CNG Fuels Ltd, the UK’s largest compressed natural gas filling company. Bioforce Infra OÜ’s shareholders are Bioforce OÜ, Vintselle OÜ and CNG Fuels Ltd. The project is financed by AS LHV Pank.
Source: Bioforce
