Coal incompatible with future energy system - report

Coal-fired power generation does not have a future in Germany’s energy transition, write the environmental NGO WWF Germany and the green power provider LichtBlick in a joint report, seen by the Clean Energy Wire. In their report “Dead end coal – Why coal use does not have a future,” which will be published ahead of the next meeting of Germany’s coal exit commission, WWF and LichtBlick examine six theses, including “a coal country cannot be a global climate pioneer;” “coal is not cheap;” and “coal is needed less and less for a secure power supply.” They argue that renewable energies no longer make the energy system more expensive and that old coal plants have little economic value. “They survive economically, because the consequential damages are hardly taken into account in the current market framework, and because they are able to increasingly flood neighbouring countries with climate-harmful electricity,” says the report. A coal exit may be politically complex, but also without alternative, it concludes.

The report will be published in a webinar on 22 August 2018 (10am CEST) here.

For background, read CLEW’s “Commission watch – Managing Germany’s coal phase-out” and the factsheet Germany’s coal exit commission.