VITA Genossenschaft

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The citizens' energy cooperative VITA is one of four shareholders of Energieversorgung Titisee-Neustadt GmbH (evtn) and an important local player in climate and energy protection. In addition to its role as a local heating network operator through its participation in evtn, VITA also plans its own projects in the interests of the energy transition and climate protection and carries out important public relations and networking work in the region.

Vita Bürgerenergie Genossenschaft was founded in 2011 with the aim of using citizen capital to participate in the buyback of the electricity grid from the then operator, Energiedienst AG. To buy back the electricity grid, evtn (Energieversorgung Titisee-Neustadt GmbH) was founded in 2012, which was a merger of the town of Titisee-Neustadt, EWS Elektirizitätswerke Schönau e.G. and the VITA citizens' cooperative. As the smallest shareholder, Vita owned 10% of evtn. In addition to operating the electricity grid, evtn also took on its own projects. For example, the Titisee-Neustadt local heating network was planned in 2020 and put into operation in 2022, in which citizens participated through the VITA cooperative with €110,000 and thus made a significant contribution to the implementation of the local heating network.

However, due to political and economic developments, evtn has increasingly run into financial difficulties in recent years. A realignment of evtn now envisages separating from electricity grid operation and concentrating on the remaining business areas of local heating grid operation and the sale of electricity and local heating. In addition, a fourth shareholder, Badenova, was added to evtn at the beginning of 2023. As VITA did not increase its equity, Vita's share in evtn fell to 3.6%.

The Vita Bürgerenergie Genossenschaft was founded in 2011 with the aim of using citizen capital to participate in the buyback of the electricity grid. The organization as a cooperative offered citizens the opportunity to become members of the cooperative and to individually contribute capital to the cooperative in order to ultimately participate in the buyback together as a cooperative.

Tasks:
- Implementation of own renewable energy projects - planning, financing (through loans), installation, construction.
- Networking and public relations work for sustainable projects in the region.
- Recruiting new customers for the evtn.

Roles:
- Members: currently approx. 300. Pay entrance fee and membership fee, are invited to the general assembly (approx. 40 attend) and elect the board.
- Board: The board consists of X people and is active on a voluntary basis. It convenes the General Meeting, chairs it and reports to the Supervisory Board.

- Despite the lack of profitability of its own projects, these have proven to be very effective in terms of publicity and contribute to a positive sense of cohesion within the cooperative.
- Due to its participation in evtn, VITA slipped into a strong financial dependency. This has been somewhat alleviated since the entry of Badenova and the resulting reduction in VITA's share in evtn from 10% to 3.6%.
- VITA is currently in negotiations with evtn as to whether cooperative members will receive a discount on local heating. For households that obtain their heat via the local heating network in Titisee-Neustadt, it is not a prerequisite to be a member of the VITA cooperative.

The Titisee-Neustadt local heating network was put into operation in 2022. This consists of a wood chip plant and two small combined heat and power plants and is operated by evtn. At the same time, VITA also commissioned its first PV system in 2021, which supplies around 35 households.