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Brown coal power plant in Neurath (North Rhine-Westphalia): volume and effect unclear
Photo:
Federico Gambarini / dpa
According to economist Michael Hüther, the interventions in the electricity market planned by the traffic light coalition leave many questions unanswered.
"The taxation of chance profits remains just as incalculable as the resulting relief for electricity customers," said the director of the employer-related Institute of German Economics of the "Rheinische Post".
The concept of "accidental gains" does not change anything about the regulatory questionability.
Because the market design for the European electricity market has good reasons aimed at driving investment in renewable energy.
"All in all, the package offers vague solutions whose volume and impact remain unclear."
The traffic light coalition presented a third relief package on Sunday.
One planned measure is that a reduced price should apply for a certain basic consumption of electricity.
For an additional consumption beyond that, the price would not be limited.
The price brake is to be financed by skimming off excessive profits on the electricity market.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) explained on Sunday on ZDF that the prices on the electricity market are currently determined by gas-fired power plants.
The measure that was adopted was intended to skim off excessive profits from companies that produce electricity with wind power, solar systems or nuclear power and produce it significantly cheaper than gas-fired power plants.
Hüther emphasized that the gas price has such a lasting effect on the price of electricity because there is no electricity that can be produced more cheaply.
»That should change again in the autumn.
It would be important to speed up the gas-fired power plants from generating electricity and connect cheaper coal-fired power plants to the grid.”
mik/dpa-AFX