22 Jun 2017

Chancellery Chief rejects calls to lift caps on offshore wind

Clean Energy Wire

Germany’s chancellery chief Peter Altmaier has stressed the need to maintain caps on new offshore wind development in order to incentivize companies to lower the cost of the technology. Limits to the amount of new capacity in the tenders were necessary for competitive bidding, Altmaier told the annual conference of utilities association BDEW in Berlin. Environmentalists and renewable lobbies have called to lift the caps on offshore expansion after two companies won the right to build new offshore wind parks with zero-subsidy bids. “As soon as the amount (tendered) is large again, any need to think about competitive prices falls away,” Altmaier said. In a speech largely focusing on the current government’s energy policy record for the closing legislative period, he also hinted at the need to change the way the renewables support is financed after September’s elections in order to keep power price rises in check, though he fell short of hinting what change he would favour.

Find an article on the offshore wind auction results here and background on the debate about changing the financing mechanism for renewables in a factsheet.

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