Production of electricity and heat: documentation of statistics

The statistics contain annual data on Finland’s production of electricity and district and industrial heat by production mode and fuel.

The statistics describe the production of electricity and heat as well as fuels used in production in Finland.
 

The population of the statistics consists of electricity and heat producers. The statistics cover all electricity producers connected to the electricity grid, including producers of combined heat and power. For separate heat production the limit is an annual production of 10,000 MWh or a heat production capacity of five MW (total for plant area). It is possible to deviate from these limits if the plant area in question is particularly significant in its branch of industry or municipality of location, for example. Each plant area is associated to a site and an enterprise. Enterprise data derive from the Business Register. The challenge when it comes to some site data is that not all remotely controlled power plants have staff or turnover, which means that they are not necessarily included in the Business Register.

Energy production data are collected by plant area, which refers to a power plant entity located in the same area. The plant area may consist of one or more sites. The data are produced by plant unit so that in the same plant area, each power plant process has its own production and fuel data. The basic unit is thus a power plant or heating plant process.

The statistics on production of electricity and heat are published in gigawatt hours (GWh, one gigawatt hour is one million kilowatt hours) and as a percentage of total production and consumption.

Fuel consumption in electricity and heat production is published in terajoules and as a percentage share of total fuel consumption.

The change from the previous year as percentages is also published for all data.

Electricity and heat production data are published once a year and cover a calendar year.

The data are collected from Finland, inclusive of Åland. Each plant (power plant, heating plant) is combined with a site, the location of which is defined at the municipal level. The data produced in the publication tables have been aggregated to the national level.

The production data on electricity and heat give a comprehensive picture of the electricity produced in Finland as well as of district and industrial heat and the fuels included in them.

The coverage of separate electricity production, combined heat and power production and the fuels included in them is very good (around 100%).

In terms of separate heat production, the data are not entirely exhaustive: small producers of heat, for example, in industry and municipalities are missing from the data. In addition, households’ and public services’ (e.g. schools) own boilers are missing completely from the statistics.

Electricity production by production mode covers from 1960 onwards. Electricity and heat production by fuel covers from the year 2000 onwards.

The data are final, but some small corrections or specifications will occasionally occur in the fuel data, for example.

The statistics are published annually. Possible revisions to data for earlier years are released at the same time as the latest data. In extremely exceptional cases (e.g. erroneous data), data in the database tables may also be changed at other times.

There is very little possibility for error in the production of electricity. The coverage of measured and reported production is clearly over 99 per cent of total production. In electricity production by fuel and production mode, the margin of error is hardly higher than this, apart from production of solar power, which is obtained as a combination of measured and modelled data.

The reported production of district heat does not cover all small municipalities, but the total margin of error (the difference between the reported and actual total production) has been estimated to be at most one to two per cent of total production. The error in the reported data is of the same magnitude as in the production of electricity.

The coverage is not as good in the production of industrial heat as in district heat. The error in the reported data can be slightly bigger than in district heat, because the production of industrial heat is not necessarily measured, except for sold industrial heat. Statistical bias may arise in the production of industrial heat, because it may sometimes be difficult to separate the production of industrial heat from the final consumption of fuels in manufacturing. This is not a problem for sold industrial heat but in order to avoid bias, industrial heat produced by manufacturing for own use should be examined together with total energy use in manufacturing: Energy use in manufacturing.

The data are published for each calendar year approximately 11 months from the end of the year in question.

There is no time lag in the statistics on production of electricity and heat; the data were published according to the release calendar.

The statistics on the production of electricity cover all electricity connected to the electricity grid produced in Finland. A significant share of the production of heat is also included in the statistics: for district heat nearly all production; for industrial heat the coverage is slightly lower because the parallel statistics - Energy use in manufacturing - cover final energy consumption, and the division between production and final consumption of industrial heat is in some cases challenging.

The data may change slightly from the previous year, in which case they are naturally updated into the database. In general, the changes are, however, small.

All changes are updated into the database in connection with the following release at the latest. Changes bigger than minor can be updated into the database during the publication cycle as well.

The statistics on production of electricity and heat are comparable with corresponding statistics of other EU and OECD countries due to common definitions stated in the Regulation on energy statistics and in the OECD/IEA reporting guidelines. There may be some differences in combined heat and power production due to the practice always used in Finland to make a clear distinction between combined electricity production and separate electricity production even if a combined heat and power plant also produces separate electricity (so-called condensing power). In international energy statistics, all countries cannot separate combined electricity production from all electricity produced in combined heat and power plants. In this respect Statistics Finland's data are thus more accurate than those of other countries on average. However, this affects comparability only when examining electricity production on a fairly detailed level. Total electricity production is the most internationally comparable of all figures in energy statistics.

In international statistics, only sold heat and related fuels are reported in heat production. Heat produced for own use in manufacturing is not reported, but the fuels related to it are included in energy use in manufacturing. In corresponding statistics in Finland, heat produced by manufacturing in the transformation sector is recorded as heat production and corresponding fuels as input in the transformation sector.

The export and import volumes of electricity can be compared reflected against Estonia, Sweden, Norway and Russia. The quantities are measured, so there are no major differences between them. Deviations may be caused by transmission loss due to the geographical location of the measurements: electricity exported from Finland to Sweden is measured in Finland, but Sweden measures the same electricity imported from Finland in Sweden.

The time series of the statistics are comparable as concerns the production of electricity. In production of district and industrial heat, comparability is not quite as good because small district heating plants and producers of industrial heat have been added annually to the data collection throughout the 2000s. When examining individual plants, the data concerning the time series are comparable throughout the 2000s. In the most important fuel groups (hard coal, natural gas, oil, renewable fuels) the comparability of the time series in the 2000s is, however, so good that the trends of relative shares of fuels in electricity and heat production can be clearly and reliably identified in the statistics.

In addition to Statistics Finland, statistics on production of electricity and heat are mainly produced by Finnish Energy, which publishes statistics on electricity production and district heating statistics.

Finnish Energy’s statistics on the production of electricity are fully coherent with Statistics Finland's corresponding set of statistics. There are minor differences in details of the distribution of electricity production with regard to electricity produced in connection with industrial and district heat production.

The district heating statistics of Finnish Energy cover only district heating and related fuels of member companies/corporations of said organisation. Statistics Finland's production of district heat also includes production and fuel data of several dozen smaller heating plants.

Emissions caused by energy production form a central part of the GHG inventory. Emissions from production of electricity and heat form a significant part of the inventory. The statistics on production of electricity and heat are fully coherent with the GHG inventory concerning emissions caused by fuel consumption in the production of electricity and heat.

Energy statistics form a coherent entity, where various parts are used to form, for example, the national energy balance and for example, the figures of the statistics on production of electricity are used in the statistics on energy supply and consumption. Thus, the coherence between different sets of energy statistics is good.

The raw data are slightly more detailed than the published data. For example, separate heat production is so-called reduction heat produced in combined heat and power plants and is collected separately but in the published data reduction heat is combined with heat produced in heating plants. Similarly, fuel-specific data are more detailed in the raw data than in the releases.

Statistics Finland's inquiry on the production of heat is carried out as a web inquiry.

The data are collected once a year.

Data protection is a fundamental principle of official statistics, by which the availability of reliable basic data and the confidence of data suppliers is ensured. Attending to the protection of data is a prerequisite for the trust Statistics Finland must have when collecting data.

Efforts have been made to minimise the response burden so that there is no overlapping data collection.

The data obtained from Finnish Energy are transferred to the production database using data transmission programs (SAS EG). The data of Statistics Finland's web inquiry on production of heat are automatically transferred to the production database. Data for individual plants are also transferred manually to the production database.

Imputation and comparison of data between fuel data from different sources are carried out either in separate files, which contain plant-specific data on fuels from Finnish Energy, the Energy Authority’s emissions trading data and the environmental administration’s YLVA database or in the production database by manual comparison. As a result of the comparison, possible necessary specifications and imputations are made manually to the production database.

Once the data have been benchmarked and validated, a database cube is made from which the necessary aggregated data are obtained for the StatFin tables, the Energy Statistics table service and international reporting.

During the data collection and production of statistics, Statistics Finland is constantly in contact with data providers, such as Finnish Energy and also, where necessary, with individual plants and collectively also with the Natural Resources Institute Finland in order to ensure the coherence and correctness of the data.

Comparison and benchmarking of fuel consumption with Statistics Finland's GHG inventory data is an essential part of quality assurance. This benchmarking is made by comparing plant-specific data and finally in terms of total consumption fuel-specifically.

Data on some variables are not necessarily available so they have to be imputed in some cases. The share of such estimated data is clearly under one per cent of all data.

The statistics comply with the standards applied to international statistics (Eurostat, IEA), and as they change Statistics Finland updates its own practices to correspond to the changed standards.

The methodological description of the statistics on production of electricity and heat is part of the quality description of the statistics.

Statistics Finland

Economic Statistics

The European Union's Regulation on energy statistics (2008/1099/EC) is the legal basis for Statistics Finland's energy statistics. All collected electricity and heat production data are ultimately based on this Regulation. Statistics Finland collects some of the data with its own inquiry on heat production, but most of the data are obtained through cooperation partners to avoid overlapping data collection. Finnish Energy and the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities are external data sources. In addition, plant-specific fuel data are compared, for example,  to the Natural Resources Institute Finland's wood consumption statistics, emissions trading data and data in the environmental administration's YLVA database.

The compilation of statistics is guided by the Statistics Act. The Statistics Act contains provisions on collection of data, processing of data and the obligation to provide data. Besides the Statistics Act, the Data Protection Act and the Act on the Openness of Government Activities are applied to processing of data when producing statistics. 

Statistics Finland compiles statistics in line with the EU’s regulations applicable to statistics, which steer the statistical agencies of all EU Member States.  

Further information: Statistical legislation 

The statistics belong to the Official Statistics of Finland (OSF) and to the European Statistical System (ESS).

The obligation to provide data is statutory and based on the Statistics Act (280/2004, Section 14) according to which practitioners of trade are obliged to provide Statistics Finland with such data that are necessary for the compilation of statistics. The Regulation on energy statistics (2008/1099/EC) obliges Statistics Finland to report data, of which the statistics on production of electricity and heat are an important part, to the EU.

Statistics Finland is obliged to report energy statistics to the IEA, which is an organisation within the OECD framework.

The data protection of data collected for statistical purposes is guaranteed in accordance with the requirements of the Statistics Act (280/2004), the Act on the Openness of Government Activities (621/1999), the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679 and the Data Protection Act (1050/2018). The data materials are protected at all stages of processing with the necessary physical and technical solutions. Statistics Finland has compiled detailed directions and instructions for confidential processing of the data. Employees have access only to the data essential for their duties. The premises where unit-level data are processed are not accessible to outsiders. Members of the personnel have signed a pledge of secrecy upon entering the service. Violation of data protection is punishable. 

Further information: Data protection | Statistics Finland (stat.fi) 

The publication tables of the statistics on production of electricity and heat have been produced by aggregating plant data to the national level and by using the fuel classification at such a rough level that small cell frequencies cannot be generated.

The data of the statistics are not released outside Statistics Finland in identifiable form. Use of the data for scientific research and statistical surveys is possible only on the basis of a separate application for licence to use statistical data and in unidentifiable form.

Further information about user licences.

Statistics Finland publishes new statistical data at 8 am on weekdays in its web service. The release times of statistics are given in advance in the release calendar available in the web service. The data are public after they have been updated in the web service. 

Further information: Publication principles for statistics at Statistics Finland 

The data are published annually at the turn of October and November. The principle is that the data must be as final as possible and benchmarked, e.g.  with the data of the GHG inventory.

The calendar is updated on weekdays. Statistics Finland's release calendar for the coming year is published every year in December.

The data collection is carried out with an annual inquiry on production of heat to which data providers respond electronically with a web form. The data are saved in the database and checked and, if necessary, modified. Statistics Finland has reduced enterprises' response burden by removing all electricity producers from the inquiry. These data are obtained from Finnish Energy’s electricity production survey.

Finnish Energy has a statistical cooperation agreement with Statistics Finland, according to which Finnish Energy collects data on electricity production and district heating activity and submits them to Statistics Finland.

In addition, data on some smaller heating plants are obtained from the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities or Finnish Energy’s statistics on district heating.

Finnish Energy publishes statistics on electricity production and district heating. Coherence of the data with the data published by Statistics Finland is ensured by regular contact.

Comparison data for fuel data are available, for example,  from the Natural Resources Institute Finland (wood fuels), the Energy Authority (emissions trading data) and the environmental administration’s YLVA database.

The data obtained from the Natural Resources Institute Finland (LUKE) are used to specify the use data on wood fuels obtained from other sources and, on the other hand, LUKE's data can be supplemented and specified with Statistics Finland's data. This coordinated cooperation ensures the coherence of LUKE's and Statistics Finland's data.

The data of the Energy Authority, the environmental administration and Finnish Energy are not only used to specify energy statistics but also in the greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory. By plant-specific comparison, the fuel data estimated to be the most reliable for each plant are selected in cooperation with the GHG inventory if the data obtained from different sources differ from one another. This procedure ensures the coherence of data released by energy statistics and the GHG inventory.

Statistical data are published as database tables in the StatFin database. The database is the primary publishing site of data, and new data are updated first there. When releasing statistical data, existing database tables can be updated with new data or completely new database tables can be published.   

In addition to statistical data published in the StatFin database, a release on the key data is usually published in the web service. If the release contains data concerning several reference periods (e.g. monthly and annual data), a review bringing together these data is published in the web service. Database tables updated at the time of publication are listed both in the release and in the review. In some cases, statistical data can also be published as mere database releases in the StatFin database. No release or review is published in connection with these database releases. 

Releases and database tables are published in three languages, in Finnish, Swedish and English. The language versions of releases may have more limited content than in Finnish.   

Information about changes in the publication schedules of releases and database tables and about corrections are given as change releases in the web service. 

The results of the statistics on production of electricity and heat are published in the Energy series of the Official Statistics of Finland. The home page of the statistics contains, for example, a description of the statistics, concepts and definitions.

The definitions of fuels can be found in Statistics Finland's fuel classification.

In addition to StatFin tables, the data are also published in Statistics Finland's energy statistics table service.

Eurostat and the IEA publish national energy statistics on their own web pages. These international statistics use data from Statistics Finland's statistics on production of electricity and heat.

Unit-level data of the statistics are used only for producing the statistics and others than the compilers of the statistics do not have access to micro data.

Revisions – i.e. improvements in the accuracy of statistical data already published – are a normal feature of statistical production and result in improved quality of statistics. The principle is that statistical data are based on the best available data and information concerning the statistical phenomenon. On the other hand, the revisions are communicated as transparently as possible in advance. Advance communication ensures that the users can prepare for the data revisions. 

The reason why data in statistical releases become revised is often caused by the data becoming supplemented. Then the new, revised statistical figure is based on a wider information basis and describes the phenomenon more accurately than before. 

Revisions of statistical data may also be caused by the calculation method used, such as annual benchmarking or updating of weight structures. Changes of base years and used classifications may also cause revisions to data. 

The aim is to keep the data as up-to-date as possible.

The data of the statistics are used at Eurostat, in international organisations (e.g.  the OECD/IEA and the UN) and in Finland's public administration to monitor and analyse the supply and use of energy. Research institutes use the data as input data of models for assessing the efficiency of energy policy measures, for example from the viewpoint of energy dependency, renewable energy sources and the development of greenhouse gas emissions from the energy sector.

The availability and quality of data are developed based on feedback received from users. With some important users (e.g.  the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment) regular meetings are organised, at which the quality and development needs of the statistics are discussed.

Assessment of the correctness and coverage of the data by examining partially overlapping data obtained from various sources combined with ensuring internal consistency of the data fully ensures that Statistics Finland's quality criteria are met.

For example, the following general statistical methods are used in assessing the quality of the data:

• comparison of plant-specific data with data from previous years
• comparison of plant-specific data between different data sources
• comparison of data collectively between different data sources.

In addition, the following quality assurance measures that are specific to the statistics are performed in the statistics on production of electricity and heat:

• review of plant efficiency ratios, also compared to the time series
• review of construction rates of combined heat and power plants and comparison with previous years
• consistency between plant production and capacity

Quality management requires comprehensive guidance of activities. The quality management framework of the field of statistics is the European Statistics Code of Practice (CoP). The quality criteria of Official Statistics of Finland are compatible with the European Statistics Code of Practice. 

Further information: Quality management | Statistics Finland (stat.fi)

The statistics on production of electricity and heat are official statistics. The Official Statistics of Finland (OSF) are a comprehensive collection of statistics describing the development and state of society. They comprise nearly 300 sets of statistics on 26 different topics. The producers of Official Statistics of Finland have approved a common quality assurance in which they commit to common quality criteria and quality assurance measures. The quality criteria of Official Statistics of Finland are compatible with the European Statistics Code of Practice. The good practices followed in the statistics are presented in Statistics Finland's Quality Guidelines for Official Statistics handbook.

Data are released to all users at the same time. Statistical data may only be handled at Statistics Finland and information on them may be given before release only by persons involved in the production of the statistics concerned or who need the data of the statistics concerned in their own work before the data are published. 

Further information: Publication principles for statistics 

Unless otherwise separately stated in connection with the product, data or service concerned, Statistics Finland is the producer of the data and the owner of the copyright. The terms of use for statistical data.