analysis
Experts rate German climate policy as “insufficient”
In Bavaria, people protested against the traffic light government’s climate policy in June 2023. photo
© Matthias Balk/dpa
It seems as if the federal government has given up its own climate protection target: This is the devastating conclusion of an expert analysis. Politicians must “switch to emergency mode,” it said.
Despite individual advances in the fight against global warming, experts classify Germany’s current climate protection policy as “inadequate” overall. It seems like they have The federal government has given up its own climate protection target for 2030, according to the updated country report of the Climate Action Tracker, an analysis tool of the NewClimate Institute and Climate Analytics. It regularly evaluates the climate policies of more than 40 countries.
The climate protection law in Germany provides for a 65 percent reduction in climate-damaging greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 compared to 1990. Niklas Höhne from the NewClimate Institute explained that government policy does not meet this self-imposed goal. “In view of the approaching climate catastrophe, the coalition should pull together, follow scientific findings and switch to emergency mode instead of getting caught up in partisan politics.” For example, it is inappropriate that Germany, as one of the richest countries in the world, does not comply with its own legal and reporting obligations and does not implement even simple measures such as a general speed limit on motorways.
At the end of August, a projection report by the federal government coordinated by the Federal Environment Agency showed that the climate targets up to 2030 and 2045 are at risk without additional measures. Accordingly, emissions must also be saved in the next six years, which correspond to around 40 percent of the emissions in the whole of 2022.
The Climate Action Tracker emphasizes positively, also in an international comparison, that the federal government has systematically removed obstacles to the expansion of renewable energies. In the case of solar energy, it is thus on the way to achieving its own expansion targets, but not yet in the case of wind energy. The Germany-wide public transport ticket could also be a global example of how access to public transport can be improved.