BKW and EnBW plan joint power station venture in Dörpen

Karlsruhe. The Swiss firm BKW FMB Energie AG (BKW) and the German company EnBW Energie Baden-Württemberg AG are planning a joint venture to build a coal-fired power station in Dörpen, Emsland (Lower Saxony). For this EnBW will take a 75.1 per cent share in the existing project company STKW Energie Dörpen GmbH & Co. KG, which is currently wholly owned by BKW. EnBW and BKW have already signed a letter of intent.

“We will continue to need conventional power stations in Germany into the future. Modern power station components offer a practical way of combining energy security and efficiency with the need to protect the planet. Together with our partner BKW we can now take our plans forward. By summer 2009 we hope to have developed the technical concept for the plant,” says Dr Hans-Josef Zimmer, technical director for EnBW.

“In EnBW, BKW has found a strong partner with long experience in the area of coal-fired power stations. With this partnership we are making a further step towards the realisation of our production goals in Germany,” says Kurt Rohrbach, Board Chairman of BKW.

The aim is jointly to develop, build and operate a state-of-the-art and efficient coal-fired power station on the Dörpen site. Every effort will be made to reconcile the economic and ecological aspects. It should also maintain the possibility to increase efficiency by using combined heat and power (CHP).

The site also has sufficient space for a future CO2 capture and storage plant.

BKW FMB Energie AG (BKW) is one of Switzerland’s largest energy companies, with sales of 24 terawatt hours, and a workforce of around 2,600 employees. BKW supplies electricity to a million people in around 400 communities. In 2007 it supplied private customers and sales partners with over 7,760 gigawatt hours of power. In Switzerland BKW produces electricity in seven of its own hydroelectric plants, at the nuclear power station in Mühleberg near Berne, and in nuclear and hydroelectric power stations of 16 partner companies and through purchase options in partner nuclear power stations. BKW was one of the first to invest in Switzerland’s biggest alternative energy production plants (Mont-Soleil solar power station, Juvent wind power station, Stade de Suisse solar power plant, and the Jungfraujoch solar power plant). For more information, visit www.bkw-fmb.ch

With over six million customers, an annual turnover of more than 13 billion euros and around 20,000 employees, Karlsruhe-based EnBW Energie Baden-Württemberg AG is Germany’s third-largest power company. Its core business areas are electricity and gas together with energy and environmental services. With an installed capacity of around 14,800 MW, EnBW is one of Germany’s largest energy producers. EnBW has its roots in Baden-Württemberg, but it is active all over Germany as well as in Central and Eastern European markets.