Status: 04/02/2022 17:04
Consumers are currently feeling the high energy prices primarily at the gas station. But when the heating bill comes, there could be a rude awakening, warns the Federal Network Agency. Many households would not be able to cope with additional payments.
The Federal Network Agency advises not to confront private gas customers too late with the currently rising prices. They should already be paying higher discounts on their consumption. “Many households will only notice when they pay their heating bills next year how much the price has risen and are unable to cope with the additional payments,” said the agency’s president, Klaus Müller, of the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung”. “If the discounts are not increased until next year, many people will be unprepared.”
Experts expect that the war in Ukraine will make commodities such as gas, oil and wheat permanently more expensive. “We are seeing the end of an era of cheap raw materials,” Benedikt Sobotka, head of the Luxembourg raw materials group Eurasian Resources Group, told the dpa news agency.
The international sanctions are contributing to an unprecedented rise in prices. “In the coming months, many essential elements of our daily lives will tend to become more expensive – from bread and coffee to computers and cars to building materials, houses and the way we power our homes.”
Nine months speed limit
The Greens are therefore promoting energy saving so that Germany can do without Russian gas more quickly. “And because otherwise there are hardly any measures that take effect quickly, we now need a temporary speed limit on motorways – for example for nine months and thus until the end of the year, i.e. the time by which we want to become independent of Russian oil at the latest.” , said party leader Ricarda Lang to the editorial network Germany. Your coalition partner FDP still rejects a speed limit.
Swimming pools lower the water temperature
The first public swimming pools are already lowering the water temperature, as the German Society for Bathing told the “Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung”. Should Russia cut its gas supplies, city baths could also be closed.
Citizens in other countries are also called upon to save energy. In Dutch authorities, the heating is turned down by two degrees Celsius. Citizens should heat their heating at home to a maximum of 19 degrees. “Put on a warm jacket or sweater, socks and slippers,” it is advised. Anyone who is active at home can turn the thermostat down one degree.
Corporations are preparing
Companies are also preparing for the fact that gas could become scarce. “In the event of an embargo, we would first switch to oil-based fuels and power generators. And we hope that we can continue our business with the necessary supplies,” said the head of the pharmaceutical company Merck, Belén Garijo, of the “Welt am Sonntag”. The industry needs time to convert the energy supply to alternatives in the long term.
The CEO of ThyssenKrupp, Martina Merz, supported the German government’s plans to completely break away from Russian energy as quickly as possible. “Even if it gets expensive and presents many companies with major financial challenges,” Merz told the “Spiegel”. However, she rejects an abrupt ban on imports: “A minimum purchase from Russia is indispensable in the coming months.” Should there be a supply bottleneck after the Russian gas supplies were stopped, production plants would have to be shut down in an orderly manner.
Industry fears discrimination
Employers in the metal and electrical industry warned that their industry would be disadvantaged in the event of a delivery stop. “Nobody would be served if people sat at home in their apartments at 24 degrees, but the companies in which they work collapsed,” said Stefan Wolf, General Metal President of the “Augsburger Allgemeine”. Industry is the “artery of our prosperity and of jobs”.
Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck announced the so-called early warning level of the gas emergency plan on Wednesday in view of the gas dispute with Russia. There is still an alert level and finally an emergency level in which active intervention takes place. The Federal Network Agency then decides who will receive how much gas. Private consumers, among others, receive special protection.