Berlin to Exempt 1,550 Firms From Electricity Surcharge

The opposition Green Party estimates that the companies will save up to €4 billion ($5.3 billion) as a result. The electricity bills for private energy customers and smaller businesses will increase by a commensurate amount.

"It is breathtaking," says Felix Mathes, an analyst at Öko-Institut, a consultancy on environmental sustainability. In many cases the criterion for exempting companies from the charge -- the need to preserve international competitiveness -- doesn't apply, he says. "At least half the companies don't belong on this list," he says.

The list includes coal mines of the companies RAG and Vattenfall, slaughterhouses of poultry businesses such as Wiesenhof, and a number of animal feed producers. Among others on the list are regional makers of sausage and cheese, chocolate factories, solar and bioenergy companies, the Munich municipal utility, oil company Exxon and even the publisher of regional newspaper Weser-Kurier, Bremer Tageszeitungen AG. (My local paper, which is not competitive with anything. CH.)

An extra added benefit is that the companies which profit from the exemption (Exxon? !!!), can also use the proportionately higher consumer charges to rile up the people against "the renewable subsidy."

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." - Anaïs Nin