RWE, Germany’s biggest power company, is going green

It has been one of Europe’s dirtiest companies for more than a century; now rwe is aiming to be among the cleanest. Germany’s largest power generator has recently taken two big steps towards this goal. On October 1st it agreed to buy the renewable-energy business of Consolidated Edison (ConEd), an American utility, for $6.8bn. Three days later it signed an agreement with Germany’s regional and federal governments to bring forward plans to stop generating electricity with lignite, an especially filthy sort of coal, by eight years to 2030. But is this enough to burnish its green credentials?

rwe has become a household name in its home country as an operator of nuclear plants and lignite mines—which has made it the target of many a protest over the years. In 2019, for instance, activists camping in dozens of treehouses stopped it from clearing what was left of the Hambacher forest, a once-vast tract of woodland in western Germany, in order to continue mining lignite. The recent announcements are part of a much bigger realignment. In November last year it unveiled plans to invest €50bn ($50bn) to increase renewable-power capacity from 25 to 50 gigawatts (gw) within eight years, about a third of its current total.