Rotterdam has decided to sell its 31% stake in the Eneco energy combine. The city council said energy was not a public task and that therefore it must be sold off, the Financieele Dagblad said on Monday.

Eneco is probably worth hundreds of millions of euros and specialist brokers who handle these sort of transactions are very interested, said Adriaan Visser, Rotterdam alderman for finance.

Eneco is owned by 53 Dutch local authorities of which Rotterdam is the largest, followed by The Hague with a 16.6% stake. There are 44 local authorities with less than 2% of the shares. The Hague is also weighing the future of its Eneco stake, the FD said.