E.On seeks nuclear damages from German government

Germany saw mass protests against nuclear power after the disaster at Japan's Fukushima plant

Energy group E.On is to seek damages of about 8bn euros ($10bn; £6.4bn) from the enforced shutdown of German nuclear power stations, it has said.

It follows a report in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung that the country's power generators will seek a total of 15bn euros in damages.

A spokesman for E.On told the Reuters news agency that it was confident that the court action would succeed.

The shutdown was ordered by Berlin after Japan's Fukushima disaster.

As well as deciding to phase out nuclear power, the German government also imposed new taxes on the industry.

E.On and RWE had already filed complaints with Germany's constitutional court, arguing that the nuclear exit decision had harmed them as they had to shut down reactors early.

E.On said its complaint was not specifically about Germany's withdrawal from the nuclear sector, but about the lack of compensation for the companies affected by what was effectively a policy U-turn.