The Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) was once the driving force behind the energy transition. In the meantime, it has become a bureaucratic monster and is having the opposite effect. Pure bureaucracy and a lack of political will: the nails in the coffin of the future of our electricity?
The subsidies expire
For example, subsidies for wind and solar power plants will expire for the first time at the end of 2020. If there are no new regulations, many plants will go off the grid – uneconomically. The gap in green energy will widen. And hardly anyone wants to build new plants. It usually takes 20 months to go through all the approval procedures for a wind power plant. All this time, the investor has to guarantee financing.
Ever new regulations on distance also prevent the construction of more wind turbines. And technical solutions for storing green electricity in the form of heat or hydrogen do exist, but such plants often do not receive funding and are only granted temporary permits.
No nuclear power, soon no coal-fired power and the slow energy transition: For some experts, the electricity gap is unavoidable. Unless, that is, policymakers can bring themselves to extend the operating lives of some nuclear reactors – temporarily. At least, that’s what nuclear energy researcher Anna Veronika Wendland is calling for. There is no other way to achieve the climate protection goals.
Political bickering is programmed. “planet e.” takes an in-depth look at Germany as an energy country between wish and reality.
A film by: Anna Pflüger
Camera Operator: Paul Pflüger
Editing: Hans Kranich
A production of K22film by order of ZDF
First screening 22.11.2020 at ZDF