June 15, 2023
Source: Energy & Management Powernews
HEAT. The energy industry sees the agreement of the traffic light parties on the building energy law as a good and important signal. The environmental associations react against it appalled.
The Bundestag begins in mid-June with the consultation of the Building Energy Act (GEG). However, it is not to take effect from 2024, as planned by Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens), but only when the municipalities have submitted a heat plan. This means that, for the time being, gas heating systems can continue to be installed in new buildings if they can be converted to hydrogen. In many cases, the ban planned by the government would not take effect until 2028 or later. Federal Minister of Construction Klara Geywitz announced in Berlin that she would push ahead with heat planning with the municipalities.
By "dovetailing with municipal heat planning," the coalition's draft law would be decisively improved, says the chief executive of the German Association of Energy and Water Industries ( BDEW ), Kerstin Andreae: "Opening up the fulfillment options to wood pellets and deleting the transformation plans also makes the implementation of the law more practicable for everyone." There are reasonable transition periods, she said, and no more is being demanded now than is affordable.
Ingbert Liebing, chief executive of the Association of Municipal Enterprises ( VKU ) sees the compromise as an important improvement. Only with heat planning in place could homeowners make informed decisions about the available options for new heating and support the heat turnaround: "Now there is the prospect of a good law, with realistic regulations that can be implemented by municipal utilities and municipal energy suppliers." However, even with district heating, "future, legal regulations must be practical and realistic."
Unbureaucratic implementation still important
The German Association of Cities sees the right order in the new version of the GEG: "People should know which climate-neutral type of heating makes sense for their city and their own neighborhood and should be expanded." The Zentralverband Sanitär Heizung Klima ( ZVSHK ) welcomes the fact that the coalition has taken up some of its "pragmatic suggestions for improvement." Technology diversity in the use of renewable energy sources and pragmatic transition periods are "important steps in the right direction," said ZVSHK Managing Director Helmut Bramann. Equally important, however, remain an unbureaucratic implementation, simple procedures in the consultation and an appropriate funding framework.
The German Renewable Energy Federation ( BEE ) continues to see in the GEG an "important basis for the heat transition on the ground". It brings guard rails in terms of the timetable and the range of renewable technologies available for heating in the future.
The Bundesverband mittelständische Wirtschaft ( BVMW ) is relieved that the traffic lights have agreed on a technology-open solution. It is now a matter of looking at the "impending, financial burdens" for citizens and medium-sized companies, says the association's chairman, Markus Jerger: "We say 'yes' to the climate change. At the same time, a financial collapse must be prevented, which would put the assets and life achievements of millions of people in Germany at risk."
ZVEI criticizes too generous transition periods
The chairman of the Association of the Electrical and Digital Industry ZVEI , Wolfgang Weber, considers the synchronization with municipal heating planning understandable, but the transition periods are too generous: "The planning and investment uncertainties for manufacturers, building owners, consumers thus continue." The heat change may not be shifted on the long bank.
Heftige criticism of the GEG compromise of the traffic light exercises the environmental federations. With the compromise the coalition shifts "the responsibility for climatic protection in the boiler room" on the municipalities and leaves the citizens further in the unclear, criticized the BUND . The traffic light parties would have saved the coalition, lead the German climate policy however "further against the wall". For the Deutsche Umwelthilfe , the GEG is now "a low point for climate policy." With it the heat change is shifted to the next government and "the fairy tale of hydrogen-capable gas heaters is maintained", says federal managing director, Barbara Metz. Waste incineration is "ennobled as a supposedly renewable energy."
The energy expert of Greenpeace , Andree Böhling, assumes that "climate-damaging gas heating systems" will continue to be installed in most municipalities until 2028. With the "softened heating law" the climate goals of the coalition could no longer be achieved. Germanwatch warns homeowners of "bad investments and impending cost traps". The "keep it up" with gas and later with hydrogen decided by the traffic lights could be expensive because of rising CO2 prices and a scarce supply of green hydrogen, says Germanwatch managing director Christoph Bals. "As in the transport sector, there is now a threat of further years of standstill in the buildings sector, and the achievement of the 2030 emissions reduction targets is becoming a distant prospect."
In the view of the Deutsche Mieterbund , tenants will face higher costs if the coalition introduces a modernization levy for the installation of new heating systems. The president of the tenants' association, Lukas Siebenkotten, therefore demands that the subsidies be increased.
Author: Tom Weingärtner
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