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German cabinet agrees a raft of energy-saving laws
2008-06-18
BERLIN (AFP) - The German cabinet on Wednesday adopted new measures aimed at cutting the country's carbon dioxide emissions by more than a third by 2020, the environment ministry said. The package includes laws aimed at lowering electricity consumption, in particular in private homes, and proposes calculating tolls for vehicles according to their emission levels, the ministry said in a statement. It stipulates that from 2009, all new and renovated buildings will have to comply with stricter energy efficiency standards and provides for the introduction of easy-to-use private electricity meters. The package also includes a new law that links the way heating costs are calculated more closely to individual household consumption, rather than the average figure for a particular apartment block. "Our goal is to move away from oil and gas to embrace renewable energy and energy efficiency," Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel said. The cabinet also approved a law that provides for the extension of electricity networks to make use of energy from offshore windfarms -- of which Germany's first is expected to go into operation in the Baltic Sea next year. The German lower house of parliament on June 6 adopted a first chapter of climate protection laws that aims to increase the amount of power generated by renewable energy sources like wind or solar power to 30 percent from the current 14 percent by 2020. It also seeks to double the amount of electricity generated by combined heat and power (CHP) or cogeneration, which uses excess heat from power stations, to 25 percent in the next 12 years. The government's overall goal with the new laws is to reduce Germany's carbon dioxide emission levels by 40 percent by 2020 compared to 1990 levels -- double the minimum percentage cut agreed by the 27 European Union member states last year. Gabriel said the two sets of climate protection laws will bring about a carbon emissions reduction of "about 35 percent". "The remaining five percent we will be achieved through other means," he said. Meanwhile, a council of government experts on the environment said in a report released Wednesday that Chancellor Angela Merkel's left-right coalition has not done enough to promote climate protection in agriculture. And they expressed reservations about plans to build about 20 new coal-fired power plants to prepare for the planned closure of the country's nuclear power plants by 2020.
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