Three German states present plans to boost renewables and reduce emissions

Several German federal states have revamped their approach towards the energy transition and climate protection. In a joint initiative, the states of Hesse and Rhineland-Palatinate are calling for a reform of Germany’s Renewable Energy Act (EEG) to speed up the expansion of wind power, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports. Hesse’s Green economy minister, Tarek al-Wazir, and his fellow party member Ulrike Höfken, environment minister in Rhineland-Palatinate, called for additional wind power auctions to further increase the share of renewable energy sources in their states’ power mix. Al-Wazir said that despite protests against wind power in the state, the overwhelming majority of people in Hesse continue to support the expansion of renewable energy sources.
In a separate article on Welt Online, Green energy minister Claudia Dalbert from Saxony-Anhalt said the state had identified over 70 individual measures to reach its climate protection goals. These include more solar power panels on buildings, greater storage capacity, better use of industrial heat and the planting of more mixed forests.

Read the Welt article in German here.

See the CLEW factsheet German federalism: In 16 states of mind over the Energiewende for background.