Utility to build UK wind farm

E.ON AG, Germany's biggest utility, is planning to build a 700 million-pound wind farm off the coast of Yorkshire in northeast England. The planning application for the project was submitted yesterday.

The proposed Humber Gateway Offshore Wind Farm will have a capacity of 300 megawatts, able to provide electricity for 195,000 homes, Dusseldorf-based E.ON said yesterday.

The project "will displace the emission of hundreds of thousands of tons of carbon dioxide every year and will make a significant contribution to helping the government meet its tough renewable energy targets", Paul Golby, chief executive officer of E.ON UK, said.

The United Kingdom has a European Union target of obtaining 15 percent of its energy requirement from so-called "green" sources by 2020 to help reduce emissions of carbon dioxide, blamed by scientists for climate change.

The UK has set a target to cut carbon dioxide emissions 60 percent by 2050, paving the way for increased production from nuclear and alternative energy sources such as wind turbines. Renewable-energy supplies currently account for less than 5 percent of total electricity output.

Firm upgraded

E.ON AG was upgraded to "overweight" from "equal-weight" at Morgan Stanley yesterday, while the brokerage cut its recommendation for RWE AG to "equal-weight".

Most of the "bad news" in E.ON's investment program, "such as outlays in Russia and Iberia, has already been completed and, as such, is already priced in," London-based analyst Tanja Markloff wrote in a report to clients yesterday.

RWE, Germany's second-biggest utility, was downgraded from "overweight" on the rising cost of fuel and carbon-dioxide emissions. We are "far more confident in our investment case for E.ON than RWE, where we see greater risk in some areas", Markloff said.

E.ON's price estimate was lifted 13 percent to 167 euros. The price projection for RWE was trimmed 5.3 percent to 107 euros.

Agencies

(China Daily 04/08/2008 page16)