10/25/2016, 17:45
| Ad hoc announcement pursuant to Art. 53 LR
Lausanne – In connection with transfer of the Swiss transmission network, the Swiss Federal Electricity Commission (EICom) ruled on the valuation method used to determine the respective value of the transmission network installations. The complex transfer process was carried out by the former owners, including Alpiq, together with the new owner Swissgrid at the beginning of 2013. A new ruling on the underlying valuation method for the installations was issued on 20 October 2016. This will result in higher compensation for Alpiq. The advance payment amounting to approximately CHF 100 million is expected in the first quarter of 2017.
Swissgrid has been the owner of the Swiss transmission network and installations since the beginning of 2013. The complex transfer was planned and realised together with the former transmission network owners. The Federal Electricity Commission (EICom) ruled on a valuation method for the transferred infrastructure for the first time in September 2012. This method complied with the underlying regulatory criteria applicable to pricing (= regulatory value). Some of the previous transmission network owners lodged appeals to the ruling. In November 2013, the Federal Administrative Court ruled that the transfer was an act of formal expropriation, and that valuation based on pricing did not comply with the constitutional entitlement for full compensation according to legal expropriation principles. The court referred the matter back to EICom in order to establish a definitively applicable valuation method.
In view of implementing the Federal Administrative Court’s ruling, some of the former transmission network owners worked out a definitive valuation method in consultation with EICom. The method has been defined in a contract between all the former transmission network owners and Swissgrid; this contract is the basis for the EICom ruling dated 20 October 2016.
The ruling is effective for the financial year 2016 – provided that the ruling goes into legal force. Alpiq expects an advance payment amounting to approximately CHF 100 million and that the transaction will be completed in the 1st quarter of 2017.
Remark: This media release has been prepared in close cooperation with Swissgrid and other former owners of the Swiss transmission network.