Environmentalists are dissatisfied with the German government's pledge to end coal use by 2038. They want the mines to close much sooner
in hi-vis jackets and anoraks, beating drums and blowing whistles as the rain pelted down, defiantly defending their dying industry. Perhaps a thousand miners and other workers turned out at the Schwarze Pumpe coal-fired power plant in eastern Germany on September 9th, presenting a boisterous welcome to visitors at a conference on the future of the local Lausitz region.
The compromise, not yet implemented in law, left everyone a little dissatisfied. Utilities murmur about supply insecurity; business lobbies fear rising energy prices. The biggest howls come from environmentalists, who want the closure advanced to help meet Germany’s target of cutting emissions by 55% on 1990 levels by 2030.
When foreign competition devastated Germany’s solar industry a few years ago, notes Felix Ekardt, head of the Research Unit Sustainability and Climate Policy in Leipzig, politicians simply shrugged and pointed to market forces. But private decisions are resented less than political ones. “People don’t forgive the state if it removes jobs,” says Jörg Steinbach, Brandenburg’s energy minister.
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