Our contribution to climate protection

We are proud of our success so far in reducing emissions from electricity generation. Much has happened over the last years: VERBUND has already ceased using lignite (2006), oil (2015) and hard coal (2020) as fuel and counts as one of the early movers among electric utilities. These measures and an increase in renewable generation have contributed significantly to improving the company's greenhouse gas inventory. In fact, VERBUND’s ETS emissions decreased by 92% between 2005 and 2023.

98% of the electricity generated at VERBUND, already originates from hydropower and wind power. As it is still necessary to use thermal power plants to provide grid support and district heating, the remaining 2% share of generation originates from thermal power plants. The specific greenhouse gas emissions for these production volumes have been minimised. Thus, VERBUND  contributes to avoiding and reducing emissions and to SDG 13 “Climate action”.

We calculate GHG emissions in accordance with international standards such as the Greenhouse Gas Protocol. Auditors check and verify these calculations. The results are published in the integrated annual report, with further details in the NFI download on our website.

We analyse opportunities and risks of climate change

For VERBUND it is a key issue to deal with the impacts of climate change. We examine the issue and its significance for VERBUND and the regulatory framework relevant to us, such as the Paris Agreement and the European Green Deal, as well as the development of environmental parameters for example with meteorological models.

VERBUND presents the management of risks and opportunities of climate change, the organizational implementation and concrete goals and measures via CDP (formerly Carbon Disclosure Project) since 2006. CDP runs a disclosure system concerning self-reported environmental data for companies, cities, states and regions worldwide.

In addition to challenges and risks VERBUND sees opportunities emerging through the expansion of renewable energy and the decarbonisation of the energy sector. By implementing our Strategy, we want to seize these opportunities and contribute to achieving the climate targets.