German utility EnBW returned to profit last year, helped by a strong rise in earnings from its renewable energies segment.
“We planned to achieve the financial turnaround for 2017, and the EnBW team delivered,” chief executive Frank Mastiaux said.
“This is a key milestone in our company’s transformation. Not only EnBW as a whole, but each individual business segment has improved its earnings. This shows that our EnBW 2020 strategy, which remains unaltered since 2013, is delivering results.”
Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) in renewables rose by 12.3% to €331.7m ($408.9m) in 2017 from a year earlier as more output from wind farms compensated for less electricity due to low water levels at run-of-river power plants.
In offshore wind power, the yield from EnBW wind farms Baltic 1 (48MW) and Baltic 2 (288MW) was noticeably higher than in the previous year, the company said.
EnBW last year also expanded its onshore wind capacity by 204MW, representing an increase of over 60%.
In line with a company strategy to boost the share of renewables in its generation base, renewable energies accounted for some 26% of total installed output at the end of 2017.
Adjusted Ebitda also rose in the sales, grids segment, and generation and trading segments, pushing the utility’s overall adjusted Ebitda up 9% last year to €2.11bn.
After negative one-off effects at the beginning of last year, EnBW accelerated efficiency measures, chief financial officer Thomas Kusterer said, helping a net loss of €1.8bn in 2016 turn into a net profit of €2.1bn attributable to shareholders in 2017.
“The success of our restructuring to date can be seen from our earnings structure,” Kusterer says.
“Renewable energies, grids and sales now deliver over 80% of total earnings. That shows how radically we have changed our portfolio since we started restructuring in mid-2013, and how we have systematically aligned it to the opportunities of the Energiewende.”
Investments in renewables surged to €706m last year, from €295m a year earlier, as the company started the implementation phase of its 497MW Hohe See and 112MW Albatros offshore wind projects in the North Sea.
For 2018, EnBW expects adjusted Ebitda to rise by 5%, with 10-20% of earnings growth to be achieved by the renewable energy segment.
For the longer horizon towards 2025, the utility plans to grow with infrastructure projects in various areas, among them more and larger offshore wind parks in Germany and Asia.
