Electricity provider E.ON's announcement happened to strangely coincide with the shutdown of the last nuclear power plant in the country.

A few days ago, Germany bid farewell to nuclear energy, with the government closing the last remaining reactors. Preceding the shutdown, Katrin Goring-Eckhardt, leading Greens politician, told MDR public media that from this point forward, electricity price reductions can be expected. However, the words uttered by the Greens leader sound even emptier

ever since E.ON, one of Germany’s largest electricity providers, announced a few days ago that price hikes to services in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) will go into effect in June.

The company said that the production price of electricity will rise from approximately 30.85 euro cents to 49.44 cents per kilowatt hour, which is an increase of more than 60 per cent. Overall, however, the increase is somewhat lower, as the base price will simultaneously decrease, from around 190 euros to nearly 150 euros per year. Thus, the price increase will be 45 per cent, which still appears to be rather drastic. The new pricing applies to everyone who consumes up to 15,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per year. The company justifies upping the price with the increased electricity procurement costs during the energy crisis.

„Obviously, last year we had to secure future energy supplies for our customers at a high price on the wholesale markets,”

E.ON explained to WAZ. The company raised prices despite the fact that it posted an adjusted net profit of 2.7 billion euros (plus 9 per cent) in 2022. The energy company had already announced the need for a price hike last year, but the extent of the increase likely hinged on a wait-and-see approach regarding the reactors’ fate, though no explicit statement to this effect was made.

Verivox’s calculations show that a three-person household in the western state of Germany, with an average annual electricity consumption of 4,000 kilowatt-hours, would have to pay around 2,125 euros from June.

The provincial consumer centre strongly criticised the announcement, stating that the increase was too steep. The decision may be even more frustrating considering that energy prices on the stock market have been consistently declining for some time now.

Since the beginning of the year, 98 basic utility suppliers in North Rhine-Westphalia have announced or implemented electricity price increases. In response, over 1,000 complaints have been filed with the Federal Cartel Office.

Besides the CDU, the opposition Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has also sharply criticised the government for its failures and inability to act. When someone from the Greens opens their mouth, you just frown, shake your head or laugh out loud, AfD says.

„It’s no wonder – without a degree or professional experience, they simply don’t have the necessary connection to the real world,”

the right-wing party wrote in a statement, adding it is astonishing how some people can repeatedly succeed in pushing through their ideological views within the government.