German utility EWE has announced plans to be carbon neutral by 2035 and aims to close its hard coal-fired units by the mid-20s at the latest.

The firm plans to invest €7bn in its "climate neutrality" transition, half of which will be invested in the expansion of power grids, renewable energies and hydrogen, it said.

Around 95pc of EWE's power supply comes from renewable power sources.

The utility plans to invest in onshore wind in the coming year, it said. EWE has installed 369MW of onshore and 170MW of offshore wind capacity, it said today. The firm is in talks with the Aloys-Wobben Foundation to form a company that will take over the operation of its onshore wind fleet.

EWE also plans to expand in the field of hydrogen. Earlier this year, the utility announced plans to build a 24MW electrolysis plant for the production of green hydrogen together with steel firm Arcelor Mittal.

Hard coal

EWE subsidiary SWB's 303MW KW Block 6 hard coal-fired unit will be closed by 8 July 2021, according to the result of the country's first hard-coal phase-out tender.

The second unit, 119MW KW Hastedt Block 15, is scheduled to be closed by the mid-20s, EWE said today.