Nov 1999

GERMAN UTILITIES RWE and VEW are planning to merge via a share swap in a move that, if successful, would create Europe's largest publicly listed energy group. The merger would establish an electricity and gas power house with combined sales of more than e43 billion ($46 billion) and is expected to come into force on 1 January 2000.

In the 1950s, nuclear power promised electricity "too cheap to meter". Decommissioning costs burst that bubble. But Kyoto targets have resurrected the nuclear debate: can we afford it - or can we afford to be without it?

The challenge of competition from both local and international interests and the turbulence of the German electricity market itself is prompting native energy giants to rethink strategy

The power sector is fundamental to successful economic development. In a growing economy, both industrial and domestic users require an increasingly efficient, reliable and economically priced electricity supply.

Germany is Europe's biggest electricity market, and its first to embrace deregulation without compromise. So how is this fragmented giant faring as a role model to its 14 EU siblings?

More often than not, insurance is seen as a cost-sink at the end of the chain of the power project financing process. But a holistic approach to project risk mitigation, much earlier on, can bring considerable benefits

"If there's one word that comes to mind when I think of Bill Richardson, it really is energy" - President Bill Clinton