Vilnius plant to resume waste burning from Utena and Alytus
Friday 14th August 2026 on 17:00 in
Lithuania
The Vilnius cogeneration plant will next week resume burning sorted municipal waste from the Utena and Alytus regions, while temporarily stopping deliveries from the Vilnius waste sorting plant, LRT reported on Friday.
The decision was taken by the Vilnius municipal emergency situations operations centre, its head, Dalius Krinickas, told BNS.
From August to September, the plant will receive enough waste to burn the current stream without allowing waste to accumulate. The planned weekly volumes are 2,660 tonnes for the Vilnius region, 105 tonnes for Utena and 210 tonnes for Alytus.
Three waste management companies, Ecoservice, Ekonovus and Ekobazė, sort about 700 tonnes of waste a day in the Vilnius region and deliver the combustible portion to the plant. Waste from the Vilnius waste sorting plant is currently taken from stockpiles accumulated on its premises.
Krinickas said the quantities had been coordinated by the regional waste management centres. The centres in Alytus and Utena asked the plant to begin accepting waste on Monday under the agreed limits, while the three centres had also discussed the volumes among themselves to prevent waste accumulation in any region.
The plant currently burns up to 450 tonnes of waste a day. Its representative, Rima Aukštuolytė, previously said output had fallen because filters were clogged and were being replaced gradually without shutting down the facility.
The lower volumes will also avoid a planned shutdown for maintenance, according to the Vilnius municipality. The plant is expected to increase its capacity from October, when it will be able to burn between 500 and 550 tonnes of combustible waste a day and resume accepting waste from the sorting plant.
The Vilnius Region Waste Management Centre will have to revise its plan because waste from the sorting plant cannot be delivered for incineration in August and September. The municipality has instructed the centre to update the plan by September 14, with the long-term schedule expected to be delayed by about two months.
The centre’s head said at the end of July that about 20,000 tonnes of waste had accumulated on the plant’s premises. The first step would be to clear the area over roughly two months, after which the centre would seek a contractor to restore the plant, which was damaged by fire last year, by the end of the year.