Fuel mix

Nuon’s supply mix, as shown on the power label for customers, looks less favourable in 2006 than in 2005. The production mix, by contrast, has improved.

Since 1 January 2005 Nuon is required to personally inform all customers about the mix of fuels used to generate the sold power. The intention of this ‘power label’ is to provide information so that customers can compare the various suppliers. As Nuon not only sells power that is produced in-house, the mix on the label differs from the actual production mix. The supply mix is determined by the number of green customers, the in-house production and the traded volume.

The supply mix clearly reflects the decrease in the number of green power customers. This not only reduces the share of green energy, but also raises the CO2 emissions per kWh. In 2006 trading and purchasing volumes were also lower than in 2005. Consequently, the in-house production mix has a heavier weighting in the supply mix. The CO2 emissions in the production mix decreased but are still higher than the average mix in the Netherlands. Nuon generates electricity using blast furnace gas, a waste product with a high CO2 value from the iron and steel manufacturing activities of Corus. In addition, Nuon has no nuclear electricity production of its own. The percentage of nuclear waste in both the supply mix and the production mix declined as a result of this.

Blast furnace gas, which only Nuon uses for production purposes in the Netherlands, is currently the subject of discussion with the Dutch Office of Energy Regulation (DTe). Blast furnace gas already contains CO2 before incineration. This carbon dioxide must now be added to the carbon dioxide released on incineration of that same gas for emission calculation purposes. Nuon believes that this double counting is unjustified: firstly, because the use of waste gas avoids the use of natural gas, and secondly, because the national Allocation Plan 2005-2007 for CO2 stipulates that only emissions released on incineration must be counted. Application of this calculation method reduces the emissions of the 2006 supply mix for the Nuon Group from 447.3 to 416.3 grams per kWh.