This year, the heating plant also plans to reach out to local scouts. By the end of October, honey-bearing herbs will be sown in the immediate vicinity of the beehives right in the area of the heating plant, and areas with acacia trees – non-native in the Czech nature, which crowd out other plants – are also being prepared. The heating plant is also preparing a so-called hunting field on the heating plant’s land under the high-voltage distribution lines. Eva Maříková, spokeswoman for the energy group Sev.en Česká energie, told ČTK today. The Kladno heating plant belongs to this group.
Already on Saturday, motocross riders drove onto some selected areas, exposing a certain part of the soil with their machines, which allows it to be inhabited by desirable plant species. They are just the kind that butterflies, but also other animals, such as beetles, need for their lives.
The heating plant cooperates with the Kladno Department of the Environment and with experts during all modifications. “We set up a motocross track on our butterfly highway for a single day. About 20 motocross riders went there to disturb the surface of the biotope with their machines and thus create ideal conditions for the reproduction of desirable plants. If the motorcyclists had not prepared the ground in this way, our employees would have had to mechanically disturb the surface,” said Maříková. The butterfly highway served as a track for motorcyclists only occasionally, the main goal being the support of nature and the preservation of the biotope.
Sections under power lines must be kept clear of trees and mature bushes due to the risk of fire and injury. Even if some people consider the intersections to be an intervention in nature, duskies, blue butterflies and other types of butterflies need exactly these places, where grass alternates with bare areas and bushes in places, for their life. In addition, areas with the same characteristics were also created earlier, for example as a result of cattle grazing, heavy machinery and mining.
In addition to butterflies, rare common lizards thrive in the intersections, for which so-called lizard habitats have already been created here. During this fall, the heating plant plans to restore them and ask the Kladno scouts for help. In the following weeks, mowing of areas with acacias will continue. These are trees that release substances into the soil that prevent the germination of the seeds of other plants, which prevents the creation of diverse nature.
The hunting fields will then be planted with a grazing mixture for animals for the hungry season. “We assume that after the first sowing, the plants will regenerate naturally. The hunting fields will serve not only as a pleasant place where hungry forest animals can feed, but also as an attraction for black game,” added Maříková. According to her, wild pigs would naturally move to places outside the inhabited part of Kladno for food, where they would not threaten anyone.
The Kladno heating plant is one of the largest energy producers in the Czech Republic and employs 250 people. The company produces heat for Kladno and its more than 15,000 households and companies. A total of five production blocks operate here, four of which are intended for the simultaneous production of electricity and heat for heating and technological purposes. In addition to burning coal, it also uses biomass as a source. The Kladno heating plant burns approximately 70,000 tons of biomass annually. These are mainly residues from wood production, which it obtains from four main suppliers.
