DW
Summary
The Green Party's Robert Habeck, Germany's Economy and Climate Protection Minister, wants to ban almost all new oil and gas heating systems in Germany from 2024, both for climate protection reasons and because the price for oil and gas has risen sharply after Russia's attack on Ukraine just over a year ago.
This week in Berlin, Habeck said that Germany must speed up its switch to renewable energy, making up for time lost under the previous government. Otherwise, he said, neither the climate targets, enshrined in law but which Germany is unlikely to meet, nor the transformation of the economy necessary to ensure future prosperity could be achieved.
When the current three-way coalition of center-left Social Democrats (SPD), Greens, and neoliberal Free Democrats (FDP) came to power in 2021, they agreed to ban new oil and gas systems from 2025 and permit only new ones that generate at least 65% of their heat from renewable energies. This will require alternative systems such as heat pumps or local district heating.
But Habeck's ministry now sees a need for swifter action: Over 80% of the demand for heat is currently still met by burning fossil fuels. "Every year, we burn more than 40% of the natural gas Germany imports to heat our buildings and supply them with hot water. Of the approximately 41 million households in Germany, nearly one in two heats with natural gas."
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