“Ecologic redistribution”

The effect of think tank Agora Energiewende’s* proposal for an ecologic tax reform on Germany’s major political parties will be limited, Hannes Koch writes in a commentary for tageszeitung (taz). Agora Energiewende suggests lowering fees on electricity and increasing those for gasoline and other fossil fuels in order to foster a climate-friendly energy provision, Koch explains. But neither the Social Democrats (SPD) nor the Christian conservative union of CDU/CSU is likely to advocate for increasing taxes in any sector, Koch says. “The eco-tax fans still have to do a lot of persuading for this to succeed,” he adds. 

Read the commentary in German here.

For background, read the CLEW factsheet Germany ponders how to finance renewables expansion in the future.

*Like the Clean Energy Wire, Agora Energiewende is a project funded by Stiftung Mercator and the European Climate Foundation.