The next Zoff in the Bavarian coalition: In the course of a new climate protection law, Environment Minister Thorsten Glauber wants to collect the controversial distance rule for wind turbines.
But the CSU insists on the coalition agreement.
Munich
- Hans Gröbmayr can still remember how he sat on his balcony almost seven years ago and heard on the radio about the plans for a new, Bavarian distance regulation for wind turbines. “I knew straight away that all of our two-year planning had died.” At the time, Gröbmayr was climate manager for the Ebersberg district. In painstaking coordination with the municipalities and the citizens, the district had drawn up a plan with suitable areas for a total of 30 wind turbines in the district for a lot of money. "The situation was pacified," says Gröbmayr today. But when the state government changed course, peace was gone. And shortly before the approval process, all plans and visions ended up back in the drawer.
The then Prime Minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) justified the introduction of the 10H regulation - i.e. the requirement that wind turbines must maintain a minimum distance of ten times their height from residential developments - with more participation for the citizens.
The debates between opponents and proponents of wind power had previously become more heated.
The opposition went by storm against Seehofer's new rule, but a lawsuit before the Bavarian Constitutional Court was unsuccessful.
Environment Minister Thorsten Glauber (FW), who supported the lawsuit at the time, is now making the controversial distance rule available again.
The 10H debate harbors new explosives for the coalition
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Thorsten Glauber (FW), Environment Minister.
© Armin Weigel
He will work “for the lifting of the 10H rule,” Glauber told our newspaper.
The new initiative is part of his initiative for a revised climate protection law in Bavaria, which, according to the judgment of the Federal Constitutional Court, is to be initiated not only in the federal government, but also in Bavaria (see below).
The fact that the Free Voters are now re-igniting the 10H debate harbors - once again - internal coalition fuel.
CSU General Secretary Markus Blume immediately rejected Glauber's proposal yesterday and said: “The 10H rule will not be shaken.” The expansion of renewable energies must be accelerated, but not against the population.
For the coalition partner, Blume has another warning ready: "Abolishing the 10H rule would be a breach of the coalition agreement."
In fact, the paper negotiated in 2018 states that the current Bavarian legal situation will be adhered to when expanding wind power.
Tenor: 10H remains.
During his term in office, he made it clear again and again that this was a painful compromise for Environment Minister Glauber.
"I hope that there is now movement in the subject again," said Glauber.
"Climate change has changed the signs." Yesterday Glauber left open which rules he will envisage for wind turbines in the future.
Hardly any new wind turbines in Bavaria since 2018
Critics complain that the expansion of wind power in Bavaria has almost come to a standstill due to the 10H regulation. According to the Ministry of Economic Affairs, there are currently 1133 wind turbines in the Free State. In the first few years after the 10H regulation came into force, the increase was still three-digit, because at that time many previously approved systems were completed. However, in 2018, 2019 and 2020 the expansion collapsed significantly: the number of new systems was only in the single digits.
Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) had declared that he wanted to rely on more modern wind turbines at existing locations. Green parliamentary group leader Ludwig Hartmann does not think that this is well thought out. “Every so-called repowering of a system must be approved like a new building.” And since the majority of the systems were approved before 10h and the more modern wind turbines are also significantly higher than the old ones, they would no longer be approved at the existing locations, feared Hartmann.
Hans Gröbmayr is now only active in an advisory capacity for the Ebersberg energy agency.
But he is pleased about the renewed debate.
“We will not manage the energy transition in Bavaria with just the sun,” he says.
But now is the time to act.
"We mustn't burden future generations with all of this." In the Ebersberg district in particular, wind power is once again a "mega-topic" in the public debate - especially since there will be a referendum on five wind turbines in the Ebersberg Forest by the weekend after next.
It would be the first newly approved wind turbines in the district since Gröbmayr had to put his plans back in a drawer seven years ago.
The race for a new climate protection law in Bavaria
The ruling by the Federal Constitutional Court that the legislature must improve climate protection has shaken up political life in Berlin and Bavaria. Suddenly, everyone involved in government always wanted to achieve much more than what is stipulated in the law. In Bavaria, Prime Minister Markus Söder rushed to the CSU board on Monday and announced that he wanted to make the Free State climate-neutral by 2040 instead of the previous plan by 2050. For the federal government, he proposed a higher CO2 price and a faster phase-out of coal.
Environment Minister Thorsten Glauber (FW) has now also submitted details for a revised Bavarian climate protection law. Experts had repeatedly criticized the previous variant as being too non-binding. Glauber's guidelines: climate neutrality by 2040, greenhouse gas reduction by 65 percent by 2030. A new funding program for construction and mobility. State subsidies that contradict the climate targets should be stopped. The repeatedly announced PV obligation for all new buildings is to come and the 10H rule to fall. He wants to present the law to the cabinet in May so that the state parliament can vote on it in the summer.
The pressure from the opposition is great. The SPD and the Greens have long been calling for more efforts in climate protection. And the Greens are already working in the background with the ÖDP and environmental associations on a climate referendum.
