“Renewables boom worldwide – but Merkel botches up her energy policy in Germany”

Renewable energies around the globe are growing at a rate “never thought possible by many some years ago” but Germany “is botching up” the technology and is haunted by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s continued failure in energy policy, former Green MP Hans-Josef Fell writes in pv magazine. The ruling by Germany’s constitutional court to declare the nuclear fuel tax invalid was just one “proof for the Merkel government’s technical incapacity”. Finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble’s indifference about the six billion euros Germany now has to pay back to nuclear companies “once again nourishes the chilling suspicion” that Merkel and her administration sought to “make the nuclear phase-out financially comfortable for them”, Fell argues. At the same time it was questionable how renewables should compensate nuclear power once the phase-out is completed in 2022, given the planned cuts in expansion, Fell adds.

Read the article in German here.

See the CLEW article Government lacks overview of Energiewende costs – auditors for more information.