Energy: Trade as well as nuclear and coal power ensure RWE’s profit increase

Good business in energy trading and in power generation from lignite and nuclear energy brought the energy group RWE higher profits in the first three quarters.

Despite a weather-related loss of 400 million euros in the spring in Texas, the company was able to post a net profit of over one billion euros by the end of September – 30 percent more than in the same period of the previous year. RWE confirmed its forecasts for the full year 2021. Accordingly, the adjusted net profit should be between 1.05 and 1.4 billion euros. RWE AG announced on Thursday in Essen that a dividend of 90 cents per RWE share will continue to be targeted.

In its core business, which RWE includes electricity generation from renewable energies and gas as well as energy trading, the result declined somewhat, however. According to RWE, the extreme weather in Texas at the beginning of the year is primarily responsible for this. An extraordinary cold spell in February caused some RWE wind farms in Texas to be out of operation for several days. However, RWE had already sold the electricity generation for this period. In order to meet its delivery obligations, the company had to buy expensive electricity.

In power generation from lignite and nuclear power plants, RWE was able to generate higher profits than in the previous year. According to its own information, RWE had already sold almost all of the electricity in advance in previous years. Improved availability of the nuclear power plants also had a positive impact.

According to RWE, the construction of new wind power and solar plants is progressing rapidly. Currently 3.8 gigawatts of wind power and solar systems as well as storage are under construction, said RWE CFO Michael Müller. He confirmed the goal of expanding the capacity from the current 9.5 gigawatts to more than 13 gigawatts by the end of 2022.