Today, July 13, Diana Korsakaite, Chief of Party of the USAID Municipal Energy Reform Project in Ukraine, and Hennadii Dykyi, Mayor of Bila Tserkva, signed a memorandum of understanding regarding partnership in the heat supply sector reform and development of the long-term municipal heat network development plan.

The city of Bila Tserkva was selected to cooperate with the Project on a competitive basis among the 33 cities of Ukraine that submitted their applications for the competition. The USAID Project, from July through December, will provide the city with support in developing the long-term municipal heat network development plan, including recommendations for optimization of district heating (DH) and network integration. This will help create prerequisites for use of clean and/or alternative energy in district heating, will contribute to long-term network development planning and investment programming in district heating.

The USAID project will help the city with procurement of software based on which the geographic information system will function; this system will provide automated control, modeling and diagnostics of the heat networks in real time, and will help to manage the district heating system in general. For proper software implementation at the municipal DH operator utility, the USAID Project will provide appropriate training for its staff on use of software, including study visits to similar utilities in the EU countries that use the selected product. In addition, it will provide technical support in the process of its implementation at the utility.

In addition, cooperation will also provide support for organizing discussions, trainings and events to inform the public about the long-term planning, network development and optimization, heat supply diversification, and long-term investment programming.