Facing the winter
Less gas consumption and more coal-fired power plants – Industry supports Habeck’s plans
According to Robert Habeck, it is crucial that the gas storage tanks are sufficiently filled for the winter. For this, inventories would have to increase from the current 57 to 90 percent.
© Sebastian Iwersen / Picture Alliance
Coal instead of gas to generate electricity, fill storage tanks faster: These are two central measures with which Robert Habeck wants to react to lower deliveries from Russia.
The industry supports plans by Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) to reduce gas consumption in the face of curtailed Russian deliveries. “We have to reduce gas consumption as much as possible, every kilowatt hour counts,” said Industry President Siegfried Russwurm of the German Press Agency: “The priority must be to fill the gas storage tanks for the coming winter.”
Habeck wants to take additional measures to save gas and increase precaution. He described the situation as serious. To counteract this, the use of gas for power generation and industry is to be reduced, and more coal-fired power plants are to be used. They are intended to replace electricity generation in power plants fired with natural gas as far as possible. The filling of the gas storage tanks is to be promoted. The lignite-fired power plants that are in reserve could be started up again in a relatively foreseeable period of time, said Kerstin Andreae, Chair of the Executive Board of the Federal Association of Energy and Water Industries (BDEW), on Monday in the ARD morning magazine. Hard coal is also possible, but this would have to be imported and stored.
Robert Habeck: “It is crucial that the gas storage tanks are full by winter”
In the ZDF “heute journal” Habeck was confident that the supply could be secured for the coming winter. “It is crucial that the gas storage tanks are full by winter – and that they are 90 percent.” It is currently 57 percent. It was “a kind of arm wrestling” in which Kremlin boss Vladimir Putin initially had the longer arm. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t get the stronger arm through exertion,” said Habeck.
The Datteln 4 coal-fired power plant on the Dormtund-Ems Canal in Datteln
© Jochen Tack / Picture Alliance
Russwurm said that Germany had to open up as many other sources as possible. For example, companies would have to switch to oil where this is possible. “But a number of industrial processes only work with gas. A lack of gas threatens to bring production to a standstill.” Gas generation had to be stopped and coal-fired power plants had to be pulled from the reserve immediately, Russwurm affirmed. Renewable energies would have to be significantly accelerated. Union parliamentary group leader Jens Spahn criticized that “if we had already started running more coal-fired power plants and fewer gas-fired power plants in March, the storage facilities would now perhaps be ten percent fuller” – Habeck is only going halfway because he no longer runs nuclear power plants, said the CDU politician in the ARD morning magazine. Before citizens are asked to freeze, politicians should examine all other alternatives.
Industry favors coal-fired power plants
The managing director of the Chemical Industry Association, Wolfgang Große Entrup, said that Germany must quickly and pragmatically use all opportunities to save gas where it can be replaced. Especially when changing over from gas to coal, all capacities must be able to be used immediately. Große Entrup welcomed the gas auction model announced by Habeck to save industrial gas as a market-based instrument.
Ingbert Liebing, general manager of the municipal utility association VKU, said that “above all, a return of coal-fired power plants to the electricity market is expedient”. However, the VKU warns against a blanket ban on gas-fired power generation or fines. President Karl Haeusgen said for the mechanical engineering association VDMA that the industry supports the plan to achieve reduced gas consumption through tenders. “This directs the reduction to where the least damage is done.” On the other hand, the possible intervention in power generation is effective but very sensitive.
SMEs are critical of the plans. “In view of the reduced Russian gas deliveries, there is increasing concern among SMEs that they will lose out in terms of energy supply between the warm living rooms of private consumers and the raw material requirements of large-scale industry,” said Markus Jerger, Managing Director of the Federal Association of Medium-Sized Businesses (BVMW). Editorial network Germany (RND/Monday). Habeck’s plan to distribute gas via auctions could mean that small and medium-sized companies can no longer keep up with the bidding.