Energy efficiency law meets with opposition

09/25/2023

Source: Energy & Management Powernews

The Energy Efficiency Act is considered too weak by some associations, other industries fear too much bureaucracy and obstacles for data centers.

On September 21, the Bundestag passed the Energy Efficiency Act in the second attempt and after some amendments. It does not require the approval of the Bundesrat and will come into force on January 1, 2024. According to the law, companies with high energy consumption are to introduce energy or environmental management systems and draw up concrete plans for implementing measures for greater energy efficiency. Data centers must comply with efficiency targets and make sensible use of their waste heat.

This implements the EU's Efficiency Directive (EED). According to this, Germany's final energy consumption is to be reduced by at least 26.5 percent by 2030 compared with 2008. For the period after 2030, the German government aims to reduce Germany's final energy consumption by 45 percent by 2045 compared with 2008. Initially, targets for primary energy consumption were also included, but these have been dropped.

Green Party member Katrin Uhlig spoke of a clear framework for energy efficiency. SPD politician Robin Mesarosch said Germany was still far below its potential in energy efficiency. Too many companies were still shying away from investments, he said. CDU member Thomas Gebhart, on the other hand, spoke of a bureaucratic tangle and petty regulations. He knows no entrepreneur who would voluntarily waste energy.

Business associations complain about too much bureaucracy

The municipal utilities association VKU welcomed the fact that the planned interim targets for the year 2040 were deleted in the law and that the primary energy target for 2045 was also dropped completely. "We are critical of the fact that different requirements are to apply to municipal companies, which puts them at a disadvantage compared with private companies," said Ingbert Liebing. The VKU chief executive criticized above all the "rigid specifications in the draft law" that clashed with increasing requirements for supply and disposal. According to the National Water Strategy, stricter specifications for water management, for example, could increase primary energy use by up to 30 percent.

The Association of the Industrial Energy and Power Industry (VIK) regretted unused opportunities in the law. With a total of seven different definitions of economic efficiency in efficiency measures, the law is clearly too bureaucratic, criticized chief executive Christian Seyfert. The VIK fears that this effect would be further exacerbated, particularly in conjunction with the planned Heat Planning Act (WPG). With the regulations for waste heat use in industry, there is a danger that waste heat for use in heating networks will not be consistently classified as a sustainable form of energy.

Data centers would have to prove efficiency

For data center operators, the law could become a digitalization brake, fears the electrical installation company Rittal. The data center industry and its IT infrastructure partners must now comply with the requirements while doing their best to avert possible conflicting goals and contradictions for the common goal of the energy transition.

"Data centers are the backbone for digital data rooms, without which no energy transition is possible," said Anna Klaft, Vice President Solution Sales IT at Rittal. Using waste heat makes sense whenever there is a clear consumer, she said. However, existing centers and those already planned cannot always take this into account, Klaft explained.

Andreas Sichert, CEO of Munich-based climate tech company Orcan Energy welcomed the commitment to waste heat utilization as a contribution to climate protection. In the law it is stressed that "within the framework of reasonableness technical, economic and operational concerns are to be considered". Solutions already existed for this, he said, and they are also profitable. "We are doing our part to finally tap the unused potential of waste heat," Sichert offered.

Author: Susanne Harmsen