As of: March 8, 2024, 8:00 a.m
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A natural spectacle: In the Geistklamm, the water of the Leutascher Ache works its way through the rocky gorge.
© Martin Siepmann via www.imago-images.de
The die is said to have been cast in June - in favor of the German applicants.
This is what the head of the Garmisch-Partenkirchen municipal utility hopes for the hydropower project on the Leutascher Ache.
Mittenwald/Leutasch
– Always just waiting, doing nothing, hoping – at some point that annoyed Wodan Candlemas too much.
So he acted: the head of the Garmisch-Partenkirchen municipal utility company filed a complaint against the state of Tyrol, complaining about its inaction.
So that the responsible authorities in the government finally deal with the Mittenwald hydroelectric power plant case.
Finally something is happening.
Wodan Candlemas
Only when the Tyroleans have made their decision can Lichtmeß and his colleagues realize the project in the Geist Gorge - as long as they convince the Austrians with their plan.
The concept has been in the drawer for many years, but the goal of generating electricity with the Leutaschen Ache has never been so close.
The default complaint was effective, which is why Candlemas immediately withdrew it.
He had achieved what he wanted to achieve.
“Something is finally happening,” says the energy expert, who has been waiting three years for a result.
In February 2021, the so-called conflict procedure was opened, an Austrian peculiarity: If there are two applicants, the authorities determine who can move forward with the project.
Since it will be a cross-border power plant, the Austrian regulations must also be adhered to.
Candlemas doesn't dare to predict how it will turn out.
But when he compares the numbers and arguments of the two competitors, “objectively speaking, nothing should go wrong.
But you can never say for sure.”
Competitors from Tyrol
On the one hand, there are the municipal utilities as applicants; they belong to the hydroelectric power station Leutasch-Mittenwald-GmbH, as do the two municipalities of Mittenwald and Leutasch as well as the Mittenwalder Karwendel, Energie & Wasser-GmbH (KEW), the Farchant power station and a group of private individuals.
According to Lichtmeß, the competitor is a private individual from Leutasch who wants to build a very small power plant that produces an average of 1.05 gigawatt hours of electricity per year and could supply around 420 households in Leutasch.
The GmbH, on the other hand, is planning big things, by far the largest hydroelectric power plant in the district: a system that generates 11.7 gigawatt hours of electricity per year and supplies energy to both Leutasch and - for the most part - Mittenwald.
It could cover the consumption of 4,680 average households.
And all this with zero CO2 emissions.
“The climate protection arguments are clearly with us,” says Lichtmeß.
The situation may be different when it comes to intervention in the landscape.
The private applicant wants to rebuild the old Tiwag power plant in the Geistklamm on site.
The municipal utilities and their colleagues would demolish the building and instead build a new one south of the waterfall, into the mountain.
A significantly larger construction project.
“The question will be: Does this argument outweigh climate protection?”
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The advantages should lie with us.
Wodan Candlemas
Candlemas doesn't hope, but is confident.
“The advantages should be ours.” Not only because he and his team would produce over eleven times as much green electricity, but conversely they would also avoid many times more CO2, he argues.
The concept was presented to the public for the first time in 2012.
According to the plans, 50 percent of Mittenwald's electricity consumption should be covered by the system.
It should cost 13 million euros.
But the Mittenwalders felt the financial risk was too great.
In January 2020, the market town council officially and unanimously said goodbye to the project.
The water power plant-Leutasch-Mittenwald-GmbH brought the turning point at the end of 2021. This means that the costs - and risks - are distributed across the shoulders of the seven shareholders.
Now all they need is the surcharge.
One advantage of the dispute procedure: Both applications are examined in detail, meaning important preparatory work for further steps has already been completed.
After that, things could go quickly.
Lichtmeß hopes to receive a decision from Austria by June and subsequently approvals from Tyrol and Bavaria this year.
In the best case scenario, work will start in the fall.
Another one to two years of construction – and the power plant will go into operation.
The big unknown remains, as always, the opponents and their power.
Normally, fish protectors in particular resist a hydroelectric power plant.
They fear too many animals could die.
In this case, however, they will play no role, predicts Candlemas.
“The argument is settled straight away, there are none in the mountain stream.”
But critics, in this case tourism protectors, have already spoken out.
One group had expressed concerns that the waterfall could appear too unspectacular and dwindle to a trickle if it were diverted.
And the Ghost Gorge will become unattractive.
Candlemas does not share the concern.
Water will certainly be diverted from the Leutascher Ache for the power plant and accordingly fewer water will fall down the gorge.
“But the waterfall remains.
And it remains intoxicating.”
Katharina Bromberger