Germany in the gas crisis: How heating became a political issue

Created: 08/08/2022, 1:00 p.m

By: Max Müller, Fabian Hartmann

Get down!

Ineffective heating becomes a luxury.

© Maria Maar/imago

Germany must learn to save gas in the shortest possible time.

What pleases installers is a stress test of unprecedented proportions for society.

Will he succeed?

Cologne/Berlin – Damaging Vladimir Putin costs 100 euros per hour.

At least that is the course that the Beckers pay in Cologne-Braunsfeld.

It's a whole morning that plumber Richard Mützel works on her gas heating.

The goal: use less gas.

He cleans the hot water tank, looks for leaks in the meter and adjusts the boiler's electronic settings.

"The Beckers will save maybe three percent on gas this way," he says afterwards. 

Mützel's everyday work has changed radically since the start of the Ukraine war.

“Customers have never asked as many questions as they have in the last three months: can we still get gas in winter?

What is Putin doing?” he says.

Ms. Becker also has many questions.

Mützel shows the elderly lady how to switch to summer mode and says: "Please write that down, yes?"

Natural gas: The country is facing a huge challenge – the Germans will soon feel it

It's still July.

Germans enjoy warm, sunny days.

Many are on vacation.

But one thing is already clear: the country is facing an enormous task – and everyone has to do their bit.

Just like the Beckers, who are now doing what Economics Minister Robert Habeck wants: save gas wherever possible.

Politicians in Berlin make no secret of the fact that the situation is serious.

Minister Habeck warns of the “biggest energy crisis” in Germany.

Millions of gas customers should soon feel what the Green politician means by that.

You face significantly higher bills.

The federal government wants to allow gas companies from October to pass on the rapidly rising prices to industry and private households - despite ongoing contracts.

This is how the gas companies should be saved from bankruptcy.

They have stumbled as a result of the throttled Russian gas supplies.

The gaps in the supply have to be filled - with gas that has to be bought on the world market at multiple prices.

As a result, the energy company Uniper was already on the verge of collapse.

A state entry prevented the worst case.

The consequence: rising costs should no longer only affect the customers of individual ailing companies - but be passed on to all gas customers.

Economics Minister Habeck speaks of costs between 1.5 and 5 cents per kilowatt hour.

What sounds like little can quickly amount to around a hundred euros in a four-person household.

Or significantly above.

Experts also consider additional costs of 1000 euros to be possible.

Gas crisis: Even during the Cold War, Moscow reliably supplied energy

It's a socially explosive situation.

And which inevitably leads to the question: How did it come to this?

The story of the gas crisis is as simple as it is painful: in the past, Germany was too slow, too sluggish, too unambitious.

And now pay the price.

The energy transition was not pushed forward consistently enough.

Fossil energy was always available, and oil and gas were cheap for a long time.

The countries from which most of the raw materials came were never democratic constitutional states.

But reliable suppliers.

Even during the Cold War, Moscow supplied the West with gas.

This has changed now.

What has remained is Germany's dependence on Russian gas.

One who criticizes this is Claudia Kemfert.

Since 2004 she has headed the "Energy, Transport, Environment" department at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW).

"For decades, Russia has promised very cheap gas supplies and thus lured the economy into a trap," said the economist.

The energy transition is not the problem, it is the solution, says the professor.

The crisis shows how urgently necessary the restructuring of the economy is.

Energy expert Kemfert: "Changeover will take ten years"

Kemfert is a believer.

The economist also pays attention to her ecological footprint in her private life.

"I live in an insulated building, ride my bike or train, use energy-saving devices and buy green electricity," says Kemfert.

This puts it ahead of the German economy.

DIW studies show that the switch away from fossil natural gas can take at least ten years across all economic sectors.

In addition to private households, industry is the second major consumer.

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Of course, in the medium term there is the possibility of generating energy more sustainably: solar thermal energy, large-scale industrial heat pumps or even green hydrogen.

But in the short term, given the skyrocketing prices, only one thing helps, says Kemfert: “Save, save, save.

Many will have to do this if they can no longer afford the heating.

But many can afford it.”

A finding that the installer Mützel from Cologne knows all too well.

Questions about energy-saving tips come mostly from people who are “financially particularly well off”.

Then he gets political: Anyone who has money should be obliged to heat their own house with renewable energy.

"It's clear that no one just installs a heat pump now - it's far too expensive," says Mützel.

In the end, it's politics that the fingers point at.

And who has to find a solution.

Germany faces gas shortages: does nuclear power help against the bottleneck?

Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) recently interrupted his vacation and assured the Germans: "You'll never walk alone" - nobody will be left alone with their problems.

Another relief package for the needy is already planned.

And all the others?

They will have to learn to live with higher electricity and gas prices.

For how long, no one can seriously answer.

It is quite possible that nuclear power will experience a renaissance in this mixed situation.

In Berlin there is talk of "stretching operation" for the three remaining piles.

What is meant is that they run longer than planned.

The FDP is already talking about the year 2024.

Nuclear power as a salvation for a messed-up energy policy of the past few years?

Jakob Blankenburg is concerned.

The 24-year-old is not only the youngest member of the SPD parliamentary group.

Blankenburg is also an energy politician - and comes from the Wendland.

Resistance to nuclear power is part of political socialization here.

Blankenburg says that the arguments against nuclear power have not changed: it is a high-risk technology, there is no permanent repository, and the costs to society as a whole are high.

Everything is right.

But the situation is what it is.

And is it really justifiable to generate electricity from gas when alternatives are available at the same time?

"The energy supply crisis shows the failures of the last few years and decades," said Blankenburg.

Like DIW economist Kemfert, he also thinks that Germany has stuck to old technologies for too long.

And made himself dependent on one country – Russia.

In German politics, the attitude toward Moscow was too uncritical, including in the SPD, says Blankenburg.

"It's never good to be dependent on one country.

We had to learn that the hard way," said the deputy.

It was resistance to fracking, a drilling technique used to extract natural gas, that brought Blankenburg into politics.

Of all things!

Today he has to make pragmatic decisions.

"It is right that regular checks are made to see whether the power supply can also be guaranteed in stress scenarios," says Blankenburg.

Whether nuclear power can make a contribution in the worst case, despite the high risks, or whether other energy sources could step in first, would have to be assessed on the basis of the concrete results.

The Ministry of Economic Affairs expects this to happen “in the next few weeks”.

Saving gas: also a question of convenience

Time is of the essence - also for the installer Mützel.

Because something went wrong when ordering the goods, now a special part is missing.

And a seal.

Without them he can't close the boiler again, otherwise the Beckers would have a flooded basement.

He has to go back to camp twice.

Around noon, after almost four hours of work, Müller is almost done.

A tour of the house is still pending, to examine all the radiators.

Ms. Becker explains that she always turns on the heating in the bathroom in the evening and turns it off in the morning.

"Why?" asks Mützel, puzzled.

Well, you always have to go to the toilet at night, because it's supposed to be warm.

Mutzel has trouble covering up his displeasure at so much convenience.

One more try.

Why are the three radiators on the ground floor permanently turned on and off upstairs?

Frau Becker tries to smile away at the question.

You rarely stop at the top.

Mützel interrupts her explanation: "The heat is rising.

It would be better for you to heat all the rooms evenly.” One can only hope that Ms. Becker will also write that down.