In Harmony with Nature

We’re careful to preserve and protect the natural environment at all our facilities and in all our construction projects. If it proves impossible to maintain nature and landscape integrity, we generally undertake offsetting and replacement measures. We focus on three types of nature conservation: landscape, waterway and bird protection.

 

We are in the process of defining groupwide guidelines for biodiversity and expect to have them in place in 2008. E.ON UK already has such guidelines in place at a number of sites, while a pilot project is currently being carried out at E.ON Nordic.

We engage in intensive dialog with stakeholders affected by our infrastructure projects. For example, E.ON Ruhrgas involved stakeholders early in its plans to construct a 125-kilometer natural gas pipeline between Lauterbach and Scheidt in the state of Hesse in central Germany. It provided stakeholders with comprehensive information about the project, while its employees spoke frequently with residents who live near the pipeline route. Their response was very positive. They praised E.ON’s willingness to be flexible and our desire to seek mutually acceptable solutions. This allowed us to take people’s environmental concerns into account. When encroachment into areas of nature is unavoidable, we are careful to carry out compensatory measures which go above and beyond the legal requirements.

E.ON U.S. has a long tradition of nature conservation and has a variety of programs to protect biodiversity. It set aside more than 100 acres as a nature reserve at Trimble County generating station. Since 1995, E.ON U.S. has provided financial support to the Ohio River Sweep, a program to remove litter and debris from the banks of the river. In addition, a large group of E.ON U.S. volunteers participate in the River Sweep each year. Finally, since 1981 E.ON U.S. has given away more than 800,000 free seedlings to customers. The giveaways support the company’s Right Tree, Right Place program that helps keep tree limbs away from electric lines to reduce the possibility of outages.

Another 200 initiatives have submitted applications for the E.ON Bayern Environment Prize. This year represents five years of the award with monetary prizes totaling EUR250,000 – almost 900 projects have submitted their concepts to date. Communities, churches, clubs and companies as well as educational and research institutions are eligible for the prize. E.ON Bayern supports projects which would be difficult or impossible to carry out without its support. The projects competing for the prize should have the central focus of saving energy and protecting the environment. The prize’s patron is the Bavarian Environment Minister, with an independent jury judging the entries.