Municipalities entitled to terminate contracts early under planned E.ON-RWE deal - report

E.ON’s interest in competitor RWE’s renewables spin-off innogy is also triggered by innogy’s 4,000-odd existing contracts with municipalities, which grant the latter company the right to operate local grids, or give it a stake in local utilities, writes Jürgen Flauger in Handelsblatt. Once finalised, the deal between the two German energy companies, however, could give municipalities the right to terminate the contracts early, writes Flauger. ’Change of control‘ provisions were common in such contracts, and several cities had already begun to evaluate their options.

Read the article (behind paywall) in German here.

For background, read the CLEW piece Deal between utilities E.ON and RWE set to reshuffle German energy market and the factsheet Small, but powerful – Germany’s municipal utilities.