Denmark’s DONG Energy (
www.dongenergy.com) has pledged to become one of the first major European power companies to stop burning coal — within six years — as it moves away from fossil fuels towards renewables.
Currently the world’s biggest offshore wind farm company (having built more than a quarter of the world’s installed capacity), DONG plans to offload its oil exploration and production operations later this year. Chief executive Henrik Poulsen said: “The future belongs to renewable-energy sources.”
The company has been converting its Danish power stations to burn wood instead of coal for the past 15 years, and it plans to convert the last two plants by 2023, to make its generating division entirely coal-free.
Other European power companies are also cutting back on coal and expanding into renewables, including Italy’s Enel, which has said that it will not build any more coal plants and intends to be fully de-carbonised by 2050.
DONG reported net profits of 10.5 billion Danish krona in 2016, compared with 9 billion in 2015 (its earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation were 25.6 billion).
Mr Poulsen said these results had been boosted by the re-negotiation of some long-term gas contracts.