Eesti Energia’s normalised EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation) was €483 million in 2023. The company's net profit from current operations was EUR 253 million, but an accounting write-down of EUR 628 million on the value of oil shale power plants resulted in a net loss of EUR 376 million.

According to Marlen Tamm, Member of the Management Board and CFO of the Group, Eesti Energia took major steps forward on its green journey in 2023, investing €779 million primarily in cleaner energy production, the development of a reliable and modern electricity network and the establishment of a sustainable chemical industry. Throughout the year, the share of income earned outside Estonia increased significantly and the share of renewable energy production in the electricity production of the Group increased to 45%.

‘Energy is a sector that requires a long-term vision and plan. Renewable energy production, reasonably priced smart energy solutions based thereon, a strong electricity network and a sustainable chemical industry are the areas on which Eesti Energia is building its future. At the same time, the drastically changed energy market situation in 2023 significantly reduced the competitiveness of our oil shale-based power plants and their ability to generate future revenues. This triggered a need to write down these assets for accounting purposes and, despite our strong business result, we ended the year with a normalised net loss of €376 million,’ Tamm noted.

Due to falling gas and electricity prices and the high price of CO2, oil shale-based electricity production is no longer competitive on the market. This means that oil shale-fired power plants now have significantly less access to the market and the plants lack, to a large extent, the capacity to generate revenue from the market. International accounting standards require that the value of a company’s assets must be assessed in accordance with the market situation, which is why Eesti Energia had to write down the value of its oil shale-fired power plants by €628 million.

In the customer-oriented business, Eesti Energia now operates under the Enefit brand in all markets. ‘In the Baltics, Poland and Finland, Enefit offers beneficial energy solutions to more than 600,000 customers. Today, most of our sales revenue, ie 62%, comes from outside Estonia,’ Tamm clarified. The biggest growth occurred in the Polish market where the company has found many new customers and gained market share. If in 2022 Poland accounted for 13% of the Group’s revenue, last year it already exceeded one-fifth (21%).

In 2023, Eesti Energia’s revenue decreased by 14% to €1.9 billion. The decrease in sales revenue was mainly caused by lower electricity market prices and the decrease in the consumption volumes of business customers.

Compared to 2022, the Group’s investments increased by €334 million, or 75%, reaching a record €779 million.

The largest part of the investments, ie €339 million, constituted investments of the Group’s renewable energy company Enefit Green in the construction of new wind and solar farms. This included, for example, €84 million invested in the construction of the Sopi-Tootsi wind farm. As of the end of 2023, Enefit Green had six wind farms with a total capacity of 612 MW and four solar farms with a total capacity of 97 MW under construction.

In addition, the Group invested €105 million to develop the oil shale industry in Ida-Viru County into a sustainable chemical industry based on the circular economy.

The Group’s network operator Elektrilevi invested €168 million in 2023, which is €43 million more than in 2022, to improve the quality of the network service and develop connection opportunities for micro-producers.

In 2023, Eesti Energia produced a total of 3,614 GWh of electricity, which is 42% or 2,647 GWh less than the year before. ‘Although electricity production decreased as a whole, the share of renewable energy increased to 45% of the total electricity production of the group,’ explained Tamm, who also added that the decrease in production and the increase in the share of renewable energy was primarily influenced by the more than two-fold drop in electricity prices and the reduced competitiveness of the power plants operated by Enefit Power.

In 2023, Eesti Energia paid a total of €391 million in taxes and environmental charges to the state. Of that amount, €99 million consisted of different direct taxes and €292 million of CO2 emission costs at market price.

The group’s normalised EBITDA, excluding the impact of changes in the value of long-term power purchase agreements, was €483 million in 2023, up by 45% compared to the last year. As a result of the write-down of oil shale-fired power plants, the normalised net profit of Eesti Energia was -376 million euros.

\*Normalised result that does not include the revaluation of derivatives