FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Germany has identified three core measures including financial support to boost energy transition technologies while scaling up green power production and its transmission, Economy Minister Robert Habeck said on Tuesday.
“We must strengthen production capacities for renewable energies in Germany and Europe,” he said at a press conference.
Habeck said the moves are focused on financial support for investments and hedging tools as well as tweaking tax provisions to enable the speedy roll-out of wind and solar power at national level and in possible cooperation with European projects.
He said the latest plans go hand in hand with the European Commission’s Feb. 1 proposal for allowing increased levels of state aid.
The aim is to enable Europe to compete with other economies such as the United States, which has proposed tax credit incentives for renewable resources, or India, as a manufacturing hub.
State bank KfW would be involved.
The government is due to issue a power plant strategy in the first half of 2023.
Berlin’s goal is to generate at least 80% of electricity from the wind and the sun by 2030, a target that is more pressing after the drop in Russian fossil fuel exports to Germany last year.
The share was 49.6% in 2022, Habeck’s ministry said in a paper outlining key points for the latest measures.
To get there, 57 gigawatts (GW) of new onshore wind turbines, 22 GW offshore turbines and 150 GW of photovoltaic capacity must be built.
In total, Germany wants to have access to 360 gigawatts (GW) of green energy capacity by 2030.
Grid planning programmes would be aligned and fine-tuned to encompass both transmission and local distribution.
(Reporting by Vera Eckert, editing by Rachel More and Emelia Sithole-Matarise)
