Despite the protest camp, Lützerath has to give way for coal – the phase

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Activists in Lützerath

Photo: Federico Gambarini / dpa

The settlement of Lützerath cannot be preserved.

This was announced by the Ministry of Economic Affairs of North Rhine-Westphalia.

This is not possible for various reasons and is therefore not the subject of the agreements between the energy company RWE, the Federal Ministry of Economics and the NRW Ministry of Economics.

The North Rhine-Westphalian Economics Minister Mona Neubaur from the Green Party had previously negotiated with RWE which areas would still be needed for opencast mining.

And thus also about the future of Lützerath.

The energy company RWE also wants to bring the phase-out of coal forward by eight years to 2030, as the agreements also provide.

At the same time, two power plant blocks, which according to the current legal situation should be shut down at the end of the year, will continue to run until spring 2024.

This is intended to strengthen security of supply and save natural gas in the electricity market, the ministry said.

Despite the associated increased demand for lignite in the next 15 months, further resettlements for lignite mining can be ruled out, it said.

The traffic light coalition at federal level aims to “ideally” bring forward the phase-out of coal in Germany, which was previously planned by 2038 at the latest, to 2030, as stated in the coalition agreement.

kha/dpa