As the shockwaves created by the Energiewende in 2011 resonated through the energy sector’s centralised generation landscape, EnBW, Germany’s fourth biggest utility, saw a chance to fast-track a transition to a renewables-led business.

The strategy launched in 2013 by the Baden-Württemberg-headquartered company, a state-owned entity with six million customers, was fittingly radical. Not only would it focus on shedding the nuclear, coal and gas power assets that at the time were making up almost two thirds of its profits, but it would also ratchet up its share of renewables to more than 40% by 2020.