RWE welcomes the mutual agreement between nuclear power plant operators and the responsible ministries of the German federal government regarding the outstanding regulation of compensation for the accelerated phase-out of nuclear energy in Germany. After 10 years, a comprehensive solution has now been found to settle the compensation to the companies, a step that has been called for repeatedly by the federal constitutional court.

The court had previously ordered the legislator in both December 2016 and September 2020 to settle the compensation for the approved electricity volumes that could no longer be produced by the phased-out nuclear power stations as well as for frustrated investments. The agreement now found is subject to implementation in the respective clauses of the German Nuclear Energy Act (“Atomgesetz”) as well as a public law contract between the operators and the federal government. In addition, a state aid audit by the EU Commission is required.

For RWE, this procedure is relevant in terms of compensation for a 25.9 terawatt hours (TWh) electricity volumes from the Mülheim-Kärlich power plant as well as frustrated investments resulting from the 2011 decision to phase out nuclear energy in Germany. The agreement provides for the nuclear power plant operators to receive a compensation of 33.22 euros/MWh for the nonproduced electricity volumes. In addition, RWE would receive around 20 million euros to compensate for frustrated investments.

In the talks with the respective German federal ministries (Environment, Nature Conversation and Nuclear Safety; Finance; Economic Affairs and Energy), RWE contributed towards finding a solution, in order to come to a mutually agreed and final settlement of compensation for the accelerated phase-out of nuclear energy which is irreversible from RWE’s perspective. At the same time, RWE sees the agreement as an important step to create legal certainty for all parties involved. This is a strong signal to strengthen Germany as an industrial business location and to stimulate the extensive investments needed to transform the German energy landscape.