German business, politicians call for 5-year delay in climate targets

Representatives from business, trade unions and politics are calling for Germany to postpone its target year for climate neutrality by five years, according to a story published online on Saturday from the Welt newspaper.

Instead of 2045, Germany should adopt the European target year of 2050, Michael Vassiliadis, head of the Mining, Chemical and Energy Industrial Union (IGBCE), and energy giant RWE chief executive Markus Krebber told the Sunday edition of the Welt newspaper.

Krebber said aligning the target date could ease pressure on German industry, arguing that Germany’s current special path of aiming to become climate-neutral five years earlier than the European Union makes the country more expensive as a business location without achieving any additional climate impact.

Germany’s climate target should therefore be “aligned with the European target,” the RWE chief argued.

“We want less CO2, not less industry”

The IGBCE also argues, in a position paper, that the pathway toward lower CO2 emissions in the European emissions trading system should be adjusted to the EU climate target of 2050. This would allow industry more time to cut its CO2 emissions. Otherwise, the union warns, costs would rise and competitiveness would suffer.

Gitta Connemann, head of the German conservative party CDU’s small and mid-sized business group (SME), also backed a “more realistic” timetable. “We want less CO2, not less industry, so emissions trading must fit reality,” she said.

The EU’s emissions trading system

Under the European emissions trading system, the EU’s central climate policy instrument for climate neutrality, companies have to present emissions certificates for their CO2 emissions. These can be traded.

As the number of certificates gradually falls, their value increases, creating an incentive, particularly for energy-intensive sectors, to reduce greenhouse gases.

The European Commission wants to present proposals for a reform of the emissions trading system as early as July.