KARLSRUHE/LEIPZIG (dpa-AFX) – The ailing gas importer VNG and the former Gazprom subsidiary (GAZPROM) Sefe have agreed on a settlement in the dispute over failed Russian deliveries and high replacement costs. Accordingly, WIEH – a subsidiary of Sefe – will assume the additional costs for the replacement procurement in the current financial year and the costs previously borne by VNG. The Leipzig gas importer and the Karlsruhe energy supplier EnBW, which has a majority stake, announced this on Monday. Sefe initially did not comment on request.
At the beginning of September, VNG announced that it was in financial difficulties due to a lack of gas deliveries from Russia and the associated high costs for procuring gas volumes on the energy markets. The company therefore submitted an application for state stabilization measures.
The comparison is now about one of the two contracts that are affected by Russian gas supply failures: According to the information, there is a contract with WIEH for 65 terawatt hours per year. Since the middle of May, this has not been continuously served because the Russian state-owned company Gazprom has stopped delivering to WIEH. In order to be able to continue to serve customers, gas had to be purchased.
As part of a second contract, VNG is to purchase 35 terawatt hours per year directly from Russia’s Gazprom Export (GPE). The extent to which these delivery failures ultimately affect the group result depends in particular on whether and to what extent these losses can be compensated for after the gas levy is abolished, it said. It has not yet been decided whether VNG will uphold its application for stabilization measures. Both contracts expire at the end of the year.
It was agreed not to disclose the financial scope of the settlement. EnBW stated that the expected loss for 2022 will now be below the risk range of EUR 1.3 billion described in the supplementary report of the semi-annual report, but will be above the burden of EUR 545 million already taken into account.
A spokeswoman for the Federal Ministry of Economics said they took note of the settlement of the legal dispute. Sefe has submitted an application for stabilization measures, which the federal government is currently examining. The government’s goal is to prevent insolvencies for relevant gas importers due to replacement procurement costs in connection with the failure of Russian gas supplies.
According to EnBW, as the third largest German gas importer and storage operator, the VNG Group is systemically important for security of supply in Germany and structurally important for Saxony and eastern Germany. The VNG Group supplies around 400 municipal utilities and industrial companies./dhu/DP/stw
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