“Land Ahoy! for Vattenfall”

The January-September interim report by Swedish utility Vattenfall showed that the company’s prospects have improved after the sale of its eastern German lignite operations to Czech EPH, writes Andreas Mihm in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. Profit after tax was burdened by low wholesale power prices, which resulted in a loss of 2.2 billion euros in the first nine months of 2016. Excluding lignite operations, the company reported a profit of 183 million euros until September, while it had reported a one billion euro loss in the same period last year, according to Mihm. “The sale of the lignite operations was a major step in adapting Vattenfall’s operations to new market conditions and a long-term sustainable energy system,” said Markus Hall, president and CEO of Vattenfall, in a press release.

Find the Vattenfall press release on the Q3 interim report in English here.

For background, read the CLEW article Czech utility takes over Vattenfall’s German lignite.