Energy consumption at lowest level since reunification
04/19/2023
Source: Energy & Management Powernews
Ukraine war and mild weather conditions have significantly reduced energy consumption in Germany.
With 11,769 petajoules (PJ) or 401.6 million tons of coal units, Germany consumed about 5.4 percent less energy in 2022 than in the previous year. This is the result of the annual report 2022 of the AG Energiebilanzen (AGEB), which the Berlin-based association has now presented. Energy consumption is thus at its lowest level since reunification, the AGEB said.
Wesentlich this development was coined by the Ukraine war. Import prices for crude oil, natural gas and hard coal rose by an annual average of 58 to 179 percent. In terms of consumer prices, there were increases of 87 percent for heating oil, 65 percent for natural gas and more than 20 percent for electric power.
Milder weather compared to 2021 also had a significant impact on the decline in primary energy consumption, the working group said. Without the consumption-reducing temperature impact, energy consumption would have declined only 4 percent from the previous year.
The energy and climate policy framework conditions - the further steps towards a complete phase-out of nuclear energy, the incipient coal phase-out and the continued promotion of renewable energies, as well as, at the European level, the emission caps of the European Emissions Trading Scheme (EU-ETS) and the overarching climate protection targets - would also have had a significant impact on the level and composition of energy consumption and the development of consumption in Germany.
Increasing consumption, on the other hand, has been the result of economic development and population growth. Thus, the overall economic output had increased by 1.9 percent, which had led to an increase in consumption in the order of 135 PJ. The increase in population by about 1 million people had resulted in additional energy consumption of about 94 PJ.
The AGEB is an association in which various associations of the energy industry have joined forces. The goal is the scientific evaluation of statistics around the energy industry. The energy balance for Germany is published once a year.
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