Statkraft enables Vodafone to cut emissions

Vodafone Germany already started switching its company-owned sites to green power at the beginning of 2020. Under the contract now concluded, Statkraft will cover Vodafone's remaining green power requirements for 2020 and 2021 with Guarantees of Origin from Statkraft's German and Norwegian wind and hydropower portfolio. For this purpose, the contract combines 500,000 MWh wind and hydropower generation, corresponding to the annual electricity demand of around 140,000 three-person households.

"Combining our own flexible hydropower generation with the intermittent wind and solar portfolio we market for third parties is key to our comprehensive sustainability solutions. 125 years of experience in renewable energy generation coupled with our wholesale expertise enable Statkraft to offer companies like Vodafone solutions tailored to their energy needs and sustainability strategy," says Patrick Koch, Head of German Origination at Statkraft.

Statkraft and Vodafone secure continued operation of Ü20 plants

While some of the green electricity was generated in Norway in 2020, Statkraft and Vodafone have been using exclusively renewable energy from Germany since 1 January 2021. In addition to German hydropower plants, wind farms are available for the first time, which will no longer receive EEG subsidies since 2021. The agreement between Statkraft and Vodafone secures the continued commercial operation of these wind farms and proves that there are economically attractive alternatives for wind farm operators outside the German Renewable Energy Act (EEG) despite the recently decided follow-up subsidy.

"We are using the biggest lever to reduce our carbon footprint: we have switched to 100 per cent green electricity – and even retroactively at the beginning of the fiscal year," said Vodafone Germany CEO Hannes Ametsreiter. "This brings us a big step closer to our goal of no longer emitting greenhouse gases and reduces our annual CO2 emissions by 92 percent. In this financial year alone, we are thus saving 245,000 tonnes of CO2."