Private energy producers have claimed that Deutsche Bahn is charging excessive fees when they have to cross railway lines with power cables to get to a prescribed grid feed-in point. This circumstance is said to be happening more frequently due to the energy transition, with more private companies getting involved. For instance, Deutsche Bahn asked wind farm operator Wittgenstein for €100,000 for a project, while charging €4,000 for comparable projects.
Mirko Moser-Abt, head of politics at the Federal Association of Wind Energy, referred to the situation as “modern highway robbery”, while Prince Karl zu Wittgenstein, Managing Director of Wittgenstein New Energy, said the fees charged were unjustifiably high. The report listed other cases, and Wittgenstein considered suing the railways in individual cases.
A Deutsche Bahn spokeswoman stated that charges for private and public companies were based on different guidelines. According to her, the current guideline for commercial operators (e.g. wind farms) was formulated in 2012 and had never been fundamentally changed.
The railway is currently reviewing legal options to resolve the issue. The passage for a toleration obligation for connecting lines to renewable energy plants that would have capped compensation payments to property owners like Deutsche Bahn was deleted from the new version of the Renewable Energy Sources Act. However, politicians from the FDP and SPD are now seeking to address the matter.
