The Neckarwestheim nuclear power plant is one of the last still running nuclear power plants in Germany.
Photo: dpa / Christoph Schmidt
For the new federal government, it is a poisoned New Year’s present that the EU Commission sent out on New Year’s Eve: the draft for details of the planned taxonomy regulation for green investments. It had already been defined beforehand that money for the expansion of renewables in the energy sector would be considered sustainable. The New Year’s Eve mail concerned more controversial energy sources: Can investments in nuclear power and natural gas also be recorded as sustainable and, if so, under what conditions? It is regarding billions in funding, with which the EU wants to reduce its CO2 emissions by 55 percent by 2030 as part of the “Fit for 55” package. The confederation wants to be climate neutral by 2050 at the latest.
The taxonomy mainly regulates private investments, but not only. The state-owned German promotional bank KfW has already put in place financial constructs that take up the stipulations of the EU taxonomy. Municipal utilities and other public institutions also invest in a sustainable energy supply. In view of this setting of the course, the draft of the EU Commission has it all. Funds for new nuclear power plants that are approved by 2045 should be considered green investments. For new natural gas infrastructure, this should initially apply until 2030. Here from 2026 at least 30 percent and from 2030 at least 55 percent renewable or »low-CO2« gases are to be used.
Environmentalists and the Greens sharply criticize the draft. It would destroy the credibility of the European sustainability label for financial investments, warned the Green MEP Michael Bloss. “Including nuclear power and gas in the EU taxonomy is like stamping a caged egg as organic,” he said. It is absurd to put nuclear power and fossil gas on a par with solar and wind energy.
Only Green Party colleagues in Berlin were quite embarrassed by the taxonomy draft, although it did not come as a surprise and was probably also negotiated by them. Economics and Climate Protection Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) criticized the Commission’s proposal as “a fraudulent label”. The rejection only sounded credible in relation to nuclear power, where the red-green-yellow coalition has so far stuck to the phase-out plan. It is different with natural gas: Here the actual failure of the traffic light government already took place in the coalition agreement. There, natural gas is practically already labeled green as a »transition technology«.
A study by the federal German Energy Agency (Dena) had suggested in the run-up to the coalition negotiations that many natural gas power plants with a total capacity of 15,000 megawatts would have to be built for a stable supply by 2030. Dena points out that these should run on hydrogen at some point. But when sufficient amounts of sustainable hydrogen will be available is in the stars.
After the ambivalent attitude of the traffic lights – nuclear power no, natural gas yes – was already lashed out in the coalition agreement: How credible would a federal government be that declared in Brussels that what applies to natural gas at home should not apply at EU level?
Deutsche Umwelthilfe even suspects that Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) in Brussels explicitly advocated the inclusion of natural gas in the taxonomy and, in return, supported the French desire to include nuclear power. Right at the beginning of his term in office, the SPD politician broke his promised election campaign as “climate chancellor”, criticized the environmental aid agency.
Scholz and his Chancellery have so far preferred to remain silent on the taxonomy proposal. What should they say? The SPD has no problem with approving natural gas. So it is left to the Greens to do something at least for their public reputation. Because the necessary »qualified« majority – at least 20 member states, which represent at least 65 percent of the EU population – is not in sight to change the draft, they now want to try to stop it with a majority in the European Parliament. But even that is not very likely.
Austria can act much more credibly once morest the taxonomy. The EU Commission took a step towards greenwashing nuclear power and fossil gas in a night and fog campaign, said the Vienna Climate Protection Minister Leonore Gewessler (Greens). The larger coalition partner, the conservative ÖVP, has also criticized the EU plans. The opposition parties SPÖ and FPÖ are also once morest it.
Gewessler threatened to file a lawsuit and said what was clear to Austria: “Neither nuclear power nor the burning of fossil natural gas have lost anything in the taxonomy.” Such a statement is not to be expected from the German traffic light.
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