Environment minister Schulze says Germany has done too little for the climate “for many years”

Germany’s new environment minister, Svenja Schulze, has said the country has “had a deficit in climate action for many years” and urged that “we have to change course” to meet emissions reduction ambitions. In her speech at the regional industry event Berlin Energy Days, Schulze said the government will introduce a Climate Protection Act (CPA) in 2019 to get Germany on track to meet its 2030 emission reduction target of 55 percent less greenhouse gases than in 1990. “This law will set the rules for how we fulfil the target and how this can be monitored,” the minister said, adding that the legally binding changes in the CPA will “affect many special laws”. Schulze said the commission for Germany’s coal exit is central to this end, reiterating that it will come up with an end date for coal-fired power production by the end of 2018, and that more has to be done in the heating sector, where improving efficiency standards was high on her list of priorities. Schulze added that the debate over a national carbon price that she triggered in April “is exactly the kind of debate we need” to make progress in climate action. The costs of the energy transition had to be shifted from renewables to fossil energy sources in all sectors without causing additional costs for citizens, the minister said.

Find the speech in German here.

Read the CLEW profile of Schulze here and the CLEW dossier on Germany’s next government and the energy transition here.