E.ON Announces Investments to Revive Economy

Johannes Teyssen, Chairman of the Board of Management of E.ON SE, emphasized that E.ON intends to continue its commitment to the energy transition. When presenting the figures for the first quarter of 2020, he reaffirmed E.ON's in-house investments in critical infrastructure for energy system transformation and also announced that E.ON will mobilize an additional €500 million for a better energy system with customer projects for climate protection.

"We now want to make our contribution to rebuilding the economy after the crisis. We see interesting and promising projects in the digital economy and electromobility with our customers, which we want to support additionally. In particular, we believe that the faster environmentally compatible modernization of energy infrastructures is particularly suitable for combining climate-friendliness with new local jobs. We intend to mobilize another half a billion euros in the medium term for such future topics, in addition to the investments we have already planned," Teyssen said.

At the same time, Teyssen expressed concern about additional burdens, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises and craft businesses in the Corona crisis in Germany: "In connection with the introduction of the CO2 price, which we also support, the German government has promised to reduce the cost of green power in all sectors by at least 1.5 cents per kilowatt hour (ct/kWh) to then only around 5 ct/kWh".

In the wake of the Corona crisis, there is now a threat that the EEG levy costs will explode to possibly as much as 8 ct/kWh. The reasons for this are falling fossil wholesale prices, a massive drop in demand for electricity this year due to the pandemic, and this spring a record feed-in from wind and solar parks. However, a resulting significant increase in electricity prices in spring 2021 would stifle any upturn in the already battered industry. "That's why politicians must now put their words into powerful action," Teyssen continued. "Five is the magic number here: The EEG levy should preferably be abolished altogether, but must be permanently limited to a maximum of 5 ct/kWh, at least by co-financing the additional costs from the federal budget. In addition, we need to reduce the unnecessarily high electricity tax in Germany to the European target rate of 0.05 ct/kWh. Together with our additional 500 million euros of investment, this will create a total package that will relieve the burden on customers and contribute to a sustainable upturn.