In February, Germany held elections with many echoes The person held by the United States in November. Voters were angry at inflation – especially electricity prices, which rose 80 percent after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 and did not return to normal. The right -wing parties have directed this anger towards the green policies of the current government, including the leading Enerwewende Carbon removal A plan made renewable energy more than half of the electricity used by the Germans today.
While President Donald Trump I promised to strangle clean energy Bring Busterly fuel renaissance To the United States, Germany is not going on this way. On Tuesday, Friedrich Mirz was from the Christian Democratic Union The constitutional oath as a consultantHe leads a new governorate government in Berlin. The party has developed slowdown policies, but do not reflect, the country Brown renewal structure While declining carbon removal in buildings and industry.
The goal: to quickly reduce the bills of families and companies and stimulate the economy. Mirz says German economic policy is “almost exclusively directed towards climate protection”, ” According to Politico. “I want to say that clearly as I mean: we will do and we must change that.”
Historically, the Europeans were ready to bear the highest costs of climate and aggressive energy policies. But three years after War in UkraineEnergy prices are still high-where household electricity rates are still a third of their levels before the war-similar to consumers and increased concerns about industrial collapse. European companies face electricity for two to three times the prices of the United States and natural gas above four to five times.
The elections all over the continent last year included a “green reaction.” Politicians focused on the largest complaints of voters – immigration, cost of living, stagnant economy – and climate ignorance. Dutch farmers revolted against a law to reduce air pollution; The far right of the Italian erupted against a ban on traditional cars.
However, a few of these developments explain that Europeans want to get rid of energy transmission. In Germany, companies say the needs of EnergieWende Organizational declaration and reforms And a greater focus on cost efficiency, not a “saw”.
Michael Stepl, a policy officer of people with poverty with Diakoni Deutschend, who calls on behalf of low -income families, including those who are over -carbonous, said he never hears anyone who expresses suspicion of the climate or is opposed to clean energy. He said: “Their main goal is to reach the minimum standard for their lives,” a higher living style will be stable and sufficient. “
Enerwewende dates back to the 1990s, when German leaders decided to remove the economy, starting from the network. The plan was the transition from the power system that focused on Coal and Nuclear energy To one depends on renewable energy sources – with the use of natural gas later as a temporary fuel. Germany lacks local gas reserves and relies heavily on Russia, which provided 40 percent of the European Union imported gas in 2021. The Germans funded wind and solar energy through additional fees on facilities bills.
The program reshaped the German energy mix. About 22 GB of charcoal and Nuclear weapons have been retired since 2020 onlyCleansing the road to the height of renewable energy. The transformation of the energy network is the main cause of Germany emissions has decreased by half since the 1990s.
A share of electricity production of hydroelectric energy, solar energy, wind, biomass and waste, ground thermal energy, wave, tide and carrots, 2000-2023
After the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia sharply reduced gas shipments to Europe, and the prices of electricity and fuel decreased. In Germany, where three quarters of buildings are heated by gas or oil, people trembled: in 2022, 5.5 million Germans felt that they could not bear the warm homes.
Painful lesson for Europe: Energy transmission without energy security is risky.
“The energy is very geopolitical, and you always have to strive to diversify your energy resources,” said Kissavartini Savarimotho, who leads the European Energy Markets team in Bloombergne. “Somewhere along the line, it seems that Europe has forgotten that it is building its dependence on a sleeping bear.”
Germany replaced most of its Russian gas with fuel from more friendly sources, if it was brackets, in Europe and the United States, and the war was used as a motivation to accelerate solar and wind building operations: In 2021, it built 5.7 GB of solar energy; In 2023, he added about 15 GB. But with 2.2 percent of inflation still burdening many Germans, right -wing politicians have not faced any difficulty in the campaign against the current government of the legs last year. Mirz described wind turbines as “ugly” and promised politics “for the majority that could think straight … and not for any green and valid bags.”
In April, Mirz A. announced Coalition With other partners of the two rulers and put Politics Plan For the next five years. Some defenders of the planned climate are read satisfactionAs it stopped brightly the long-term climate targets in Germany, such as Net-Zero achieved by 2045 and coal by skipping by 2038.
Mirz says that his guideline of energy policy is not an atmosphere but “competitiveness.” Taxes and fees on energy bills are part of the reason for some of the most expensive electricity in Europe, according to the International Energy Agency. The new coalition is to reduce these fees so that the electricity rates decrease at least 5 cents per kilowatt hour; This is about the eighth rate that the German intermediate family is currently paying.
The coalition agreement says it wants to continue to develop all renewable energy sources, but with a focus on compatibility with the network. Energy companies complained that in the rush to strike the targets of renewable energy sources, Germany has often built solar energy and wind farms in remote or difficult to reach, which led to high costs. Geographical mismache – for example, fast wind energy in the north is unable to reach customers in the southern southern – means that electricity prices can rise in one region even with a decrease in zero in another region.
Sean Gallup / Getty Embs
More controversially, the new government suggested building 20 GB of generating natural gas by 2030; The entire German energy system is about 260 GB. Solar and wind is now the cheapest energy sources In most of the world, but they are still vulnerable to wild swinging in productivity – in December, wind production in Germany decreased by 85 percent from the normal rate. Merz sympathizes with the arguments of the energy industry that new gas factories can mitigate these possibilities. It also suggests wiping the red tape to store energy, which plays a simple role today but can theoretically serve the same role as the budget.
The potential goal of the Mirz government is the building law in the country, which prohibits most new fossil fuel heating systems in buildings that begin in 2028. The inflation has left many people unable or unwilling to pay The costs of providing electrical systems such as heat pumps Failure to be popular with the conservatives in the campaign.
So what can be learned from Germany’s experience if there is anything?
Renewable energy sources are cheap, but bills do not reflect this often
In principle, renewable energy must reduce electricity bills. Solar energy and wind are inexpensive for construction, and their fuel is free.
In practice, savings often do not reach consumers. Prices must cover the cost of integrating renewable energy sources into the network, paying the price of new transport lines and backup systems necessary to balance the nature pies. Conservatively, Germany needs to invest 500 billion euros (about $ 565 billion) over the next two decades just to upgrade the power network, and Deutsche Bank is estimated. These must be one time investments, but during inflation times, it is understood that people wonder what they pay for it.
Worse than that, many European countries that have expanded great energy, including Italy, Spain, Portugal and Germany, tend to the basis of energy rates on the price of gas. accident A report on European competitiveness He said this is a structural defect. The countries must repair pricing in order for consumers to benefit more directly than clean energy.
Green energy is cheap … in the end
Good news: The United States and Europe made great progress in carbon removal in the energy sectors. Bad: Transport, buildings, industrial sectors, and alternative technologies remain much less mature. The shock of stickers associated with electric cars, hydrogen ovens and heat pumps contributed to the green reaction last year in Europe.
However, energy experts argue that more economy electricia ultimately reduces costs in general. “If you do this, you can really go to a very sustainable, very cheap and high -performance energy system. This is actually target,” said Gonar Luderr, who leads the power transition laboratory at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Research.
He said China is moving in this direction. For example, recently I launched a pilot project In nine cities to see if its growing fleet of electric cars can provide the battery storage for the system. Modern trends in the Western world raises the issue of whether voters are ready to make these types of investments.
Ignoring social effects, and the danger of the green reaction
In Germany, buildings have to pay a carbon tax that rise over time. The previous government in Germany has promised to create a fund to help citizens manage these prices in prices – to Tune several hundreds of euros a year – But reduce it for budget reasons, and leave the audience with all the stick and not carrot. Europeans remain widely supportive of climate policies for their governments, but it is increasingly clear that this support can fade if the transition is not fair and leaves citizens to bear the costs on their own, ”said another report issued by E3G, a research tank.
While some governments have sent money to families during crises to help them pay bills, others address the issue at a deeper level. E3G said that Bulgaria, Croatia, Italy, Denmark and Poland have all the expanded incentives to make homes more efficient in energy-which could not just provide citizens ’money, but helps them overcome the upcoming crisis.
