Federal government subsidizes renewables with 15 billion euros

17.11.2025

Source: E & M powernews

In October, the federal government transferred 1.37 billion euros to the EEG account to promote green electricity. Income on the market returned to normal levels.

The federal government paid 14.99 billion euros into the EEG account in the first ten months of this year to offset the payment of subsidy rates for green electricity fed into the grid with the lower market income from subsidized green electricity. This can be seen from the latest statement of the EEG account, which is held in trust by the transmission system operators (TSOs).

The payment tranche in October amounted to 1.35 billion euros. Only in February to April were the tranches lower, in February they totaled a three-digit million amount, and in March no tranche had to be paid out. The credit balance on the EEG account nevertheless fell slightly from a good 2.2 billion euros to less than 2.1 billion euros over the course of October, because the income from subsidized green electricity was disproportionately lower than the expenditure.

First of all, the TSOs' fiduciary income from the mandatory marketing of subsidized green electricity from installations up to 100 kW recovered compared to the catastrophic month of September 2025, rising from 93 million euros to 200 million euros. In September, the TSOs only collected a double-digit million euro amount in the spot market auctions for the first time since December 2023.

Recovery of the PV market value

The recovery is likely due to the seasonal decline in photovoltaic electricity feed-in. Less feed-in means less feed-in remuneration for most of the 5.6 million active PV systems. This is particularly easy on the EEG account because this is where the cost burden of old, high subsidy rates of up to 50 cents/kWh is highest.

In addition, fewer PV systems do not cannibalize the hourly prices of their feed-in times on the Epex Spot exchange. This can be seen in the further recovery of the PV market value compared to September from 4.3 cents/kWh to practically 7 cents/kWh. The smaller the difference to the subsidy rates to be paid out, the less the federal government has to contribute.

Consequently, the EEG subsidy payments fell from 2 billion euros in September to 1.69 billion euros. If this item alone is compared exclusively with the market income, this results in a simplified cost recovery ratio of just under 12 percent.

The time series of monthly market values for green electricity from January 2011 to October 2025 are available on the TSOs' transparency page. The EEG account statements for the same period are published on a different subpage.

Author: Georg Eble