"The energy transition will not work without a heating transition"

The Energiewende cannot succeed without a heating transition, because the heat market is the most important final energy consumption sector in Germany, writes the government-owned financing institution KfW’s research division in a paper. However, the potential of the sector was “not sufficiently exploited by the relevant stakeholders because of numerous obstacles – including information deficits, financial restrictions or incomplete internalisation of the external environmental costs of fossil energy sources”, write the authors. They call on policymakers to stimulate the necessary investments through the creation of targeted incentives. Heating accounted for more than half (54 percent) of final energy consumption and the sector was responsible for around 26 percent of Germany’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to the paper.

Read the paper in English here.