It may come to mind that Robert Habeck, Germany’s economics minister during his most recent term as prime minister, wrote a children’s book in which a girl named Emily experiences “how exciting a power outage at night can be.”
Today, Habeck faces the daunting task of making sure that the lights don’t really go out in Europe’s largest economy. And while Germans are stockpiling candles and camping stoves the way they stockpiled toilet paper and pasta not so long ago, they find the prospect of blackouts and cold apartments more frightening than exciting. Reports of people illegally chopping down trees for fuel have brought back memories of the post-war misery, when Berlin’s Tiergarten was cleared bare as the Germans tried to keep warm.
But a power outage is not that unrealistic since Moscow shut down the Nord Stream 1 pipeline more than a week ago. Habeck threatened to appear more than triumphant when he remarked before the Bundestag on Thursday that “we have now been independent of Russian gas for a week”; it was not his or Germany’s fault, but Putin’s, that it reduced Moscow’s influence over Europe over energy supplies.
While the shutdown may have helped ease the conscience of many Germans, who felt they were supporting Russia’s war every time they turned on the shower, more responsibility currently rests on Habeck’s shoulders than any other minister , even on Chancellor Olaf Scholz . He must also try to keep the economy going despite gloomy forecasts that the country will slide into recession next year due to rising energy costs and high inflation.
Bakers in northern Germany turned off their lights on Thursday to protest they had been left out of the government’s ponderous-sounding energy cost-cutting program to fund the bills of energy-intensive industries, from glassmakers to wallpaper makers. “Today light, tomorrow ovens?” was the slogan on the door of a bakery in Hamburg’s middle-class district of Blankenese. “Bread may yet become a luxury that only rich people can afford,” said the owner, who was desperate for acknowledgment that her gas company had canceled her contract and she was faced with a monthly gas bill that ranged from €3,800 ($3,300). £) had risen to €8,000.
Just a few months ago, many people regularly looked at the corona numbers. Nowadays it is the gas storage level that draws feverish attention. As of Friday, the 47 underground facilities across the country were 87% full thanks to imports from other countries, namely Belgium, Norway and the Netherlands. That sounds high, but it’s only part of the picture, because when full, the facilities store only 28% of the total gas consumption that Germany consumes in an average year. The goal is 95% capacity by November 1, but a harsh winter or technical glitches could mean stores are empty well before winter is over. And you also have to think about next winter, when the stores will probably be empty and there will be no Russian gas in sight.
Industry has already reduced its consumption by more than a fifth (with consequences – ammonia production has fallen by around 70%) and is currently “saving” around 300 gigawatt hours per day. When you consider that gas consumption on cold winter days can be as high as 5,000 GWh, this is just a drop in the bucket.
Energy experts say despite Scholz’s insistence that Germany has enough energy to weather the winter, it’s too early to be optimistic. Even in a colder than usual September, consumption was higher than expected.
Households are being asked to reduce their consumption by around 20%, but the expected higher household bills, which could encourage savings, have not yet landed on the doormat in many cases. The government, careful not to sound alarmist, has so far done little to encourage domestic austerity, focusing instead on lowering swimming pool temperatures or turning off the Brandenburg Gate lights. Habeck has repeatedly emphasized that he has reduced his showers to a minimum and installed a water-saving showerhead, but he also shies away from appearing condescending.
The hope lies in the liquefied gas, which Germany is expected to source via two state-chartered floating terminals in Wilhelmshaven and Brunsbüttel, which are due to start operating at the turn of the year, and a third from a private consortium in Lubmin. However, energy market experts warn of strong demand for LNG in winter, especially from Asia.
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A mild winter could have significant repercussions, but pressure is now mounting on the coalition government from within – the pro-business FDP – and opposition Conservatives to roll back the pledge made by Angela Merkel in 2011 in response to the Fukushima disaster to pull out of nuclear power.
Habeck, a leading member of a Green party whose founding principles were outright opposed to nuclear power, had sought to depoliticize the decision on whether to operate three remaining power plants beyond a planned shutdown in December with a stress test on the national grid The operators came to the conclusion that the risk of power failures could not be ruled out, which is why two out of three systems should be put into emergency operation. The decision has drawn ridicule and derision: Green advocates fear it could mark the slow return to nuclear power and, adding the Schlamassel, a German term for chaos, one of the operators has called the plans “technically unfeasible”. . Some have said the operator is simply annoyed by the financial loss it causes to their business to be in ‘standby’ mode rather than fully operational.
But immediately Germany faces nothing less than weighing which is greater – the fear of nuclear power or the blackout.
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