No need for coal commission, continue with existing mining plans – brown coal industry

The German government’s ‘Commission on Growth, Structural Economic Change and Employment’ “must not become a coal exit commission, nor an uncritical trailblazer for a national climate protection act,” according to the Federal German Association for Brown Coal (DEBRIV). “It has become evident already that the security of Germany’s power supply can’t be guaranteed by 2022-23 at the latest,” said DEBRIV director Thorsten Diercks. “The lignite industry expects the 2030 EU climate target of cutting emissions by 40 percent by 2030 compared to 1990 levels to be compatible with a continued use of domestic brown coal by the German economy according to the current plans and prospects for the mining regions,” DEBRIV said.
The association said that Germany’s lignite plants are only responsible for about 0.4 percent of global CO₂ emissions. “Even with a total loss of this power production, the climate effect of a coal exit would only amount to 0.1 or 0.2 percent at best,” said Diercks. “Existing government and company plans make it possible and realistic to reduce CO₂ emissions within the framework of the European ETS by a total of 87 percent by 2050 – without additional national regulatory measures that are compensable, by the way.” This is why the German lignite industry’s mines and power stations should follow through with the federal states’ and the companies’ current plans, DEBRIV says.

Find the press release in German here.

Find our collection of reactions to the launch of Germany’s coal exit commission here, and find plenty of background in the article Germany starts coal exit talks in bid to improve patchy climate record and in the factsheet on Germany’s coal exit commission.