A fast and consistent Energiewende is the key to ensuring that we continue to get the energy supply we need in the future. In order to master this balancing act, we are completely rebuilding our energy system for Germany’s industrialized economy by 2035. As EnBW, we are responsible for bringing climate change mitigation solutions to the road and reducing carbon-intensive generation.
Renewable energies are doing for the 21st century what the steam engine did for the 19th century and the combustion engine did for the 20th century: powering our progress. Yet unlike in the past, this aim goes way beyond power generation.
The Energiewende is the answer to human-made climate change. As simple as this answer sounds, it is challenging to put it into practice. That’s because to achieve this, we must restructure our entire energy system while continuing to guarantee a secure and affordable supply of electricity and heat for the people in Baden-Württemberg and beyond.
EnBW is one of the few companies in a position to do so – with billions invested in some of the world’s largest and most modern wind, solar and hydropower plants, generating clean energy for millions of households. There is still a long way to go before we can fully meet the demand with renewable energies. Until then, we will keep the overall system stable with our conventional power plants.
Since 2012, we have increased the share of renewable energies in our generation portfolio from 18.9% to
By 2025, we want to increase the share of renewable energies in our generation portfolio to at least
Back in 2012, as part of our new corporate strategy, we set ourselves the goal of increasing the renewable share of our generation capacity to 40 percent within eight years. At 40.1 percent, we achieved this only slightly later in 2021. And that is just the start: By 2025, the share is set to exceed the 50 percent threshold.
| Generation share within the EnBW Portfolio | Thermal | Renewable |
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81.8 | 18.9 |
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80.9 | 19.1 |
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80.9 | 19.1 |
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76.4 | 23.6 |
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76.9 | 23.1 |
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74.2 | 25.8 |
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72.1 | 27.9 |
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68.2 | 31.8 |
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61.0 | 39.0 |
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59.9 | 40.1 |
Since the realignment of the company, we have invested twelve billion euros in the Energiewende – and we are continuing to invest. The ongoing and completed major projects undertaken by EnBW and its partners featured here alone will increase renewable generation capacity by around 8.4 gigawatts – enough to supply 8.9 million households with electricity.
Each wind, solar or hydropower plant plays its part in mitigating climate change, but at the same time represents an intervention in nature. For us, this means not only taking responsibility for ensuring that the local flora and fauna remain as intact as possible – but also seizing the opportunity to further develop our facilities into areas where plants and animals can thrive.
Expanding the use of renewable energies is the most important step on the way to a climate-neutral life. In doing so, it is important to take people along with you on the journey. It is therefore not only our ambition at EnBW to become climate-neutral by 2035 – we also want to do so in a socially just manner. To this end, we are working closely with the local authorities in Baden-Württemberg and closing the supply gaps left behind by the coal phaseout with more climate-friendly gas power plants. This will allow us to continue to offer people in all regions secure access to electricity and heat and give our employees new career prospects.
For environmental and economic reasons, we voluntarily divested ourselves of 2,700 megawatts of particularly carbon-intensive generation even before the Coal Phaseout Act of 2020. We want to decommission another 2,500 megawatts by 2030 and completely phase out coal by 2035. With these measures and the ongoing switch to renewable energies, gas and eventually hydrogen, we are well on our way to achieving our climate neutrality goal.
Since 2012, we have reduced our carbon emissions (excl. supply chain) by
By
we want to become climate-neutral by minimizing our carbon emissions and offsetting residual emissions (excl. supply chain).
Our road map is based on two milestones: Halving our carbon footprint by 2030, based on the reference year of 2018, and achieving climate neutrality by reducing and offsetting our emissions by 2035. Excluded from this thus far are the so-called Scope 3 emissions, which are produced in our upstream and downstream supply chain. We are nailing down the individual steps on the way to achieving climate neutrality and integrating Scope 3 in line with the recommendations of the Science Based Target initiative (SBTi).
| Year | Real | Target |
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17.6 | |
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11.7 | |
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10.3 | |
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16.7 | |
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8.8 | |
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0 |
By phasing out coal and switching to more climate-friendly natural gas, we are directly reducing our emissions and at the same time laying the foundations for energy generation with carbon-neutral (“green”) hydrogen. On the way to achieving this goal, we are building new plants with gas turbines on the sites of our coal power plants, which can be converted to run on hydrogen as soon as it is available in sufficient quantities. This is how we are preserving jobs and securing the long-term supply of electricity and district heating to Baden-Württemberg’s households and industrial sector.
Our coal power plant in Altbach/Deizisau is set to be replaced by a hydrogen-compatible combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) plant in 2026.
From 2026, instead of coal we also want to use a combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) plant and eventually switch to hydrogen in Heilbronn.
In 2019, we replaced our Stuttgart-Gaisburg coal power plant with a more climate-friendly gas heating plant.
In Stuttgart-Münster, we want to replace the final coal power plant in Stuttgart with a gas power plant in 2025 that can also run on hydrogen.
Even in a climate-neutral world, we will not be able to do without fuels. We need them to generate, store and transport energy independently of the wind and weather. Coal, oil and natural gas will no longer be an option for such energy in the future – we have to find a climate-neutral alternative.
One promising candidate is H₂ or hydrogen, a combustible, carbon-free gas that can be extracted from water by means of electrolysis. If this is done using electricity from renewable energies, the gas is completely climate-neutral and is referred to as “green hydrogen.” This can be used to store renewable energies in the gas grid, generate electricity and heat in gas power plants or drive engines.
It remains too expensive to produce hydrogen for us to replace fossil fuels with it. We want to change this, which is why we are involved in various research and pilot projects with our companies and partners. At the same time, we are already building our gas power plants and grids to be “H₂-ready” in order to be able to convert them to run on hydrogen as quickly as possible.
As part of our sustainability reporting, we create transparency on all of EnBW’s performance indicators covering environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria. They allow you to monitor and evaluate our progress for yourself.
