Albers: "EU guideline provides good basis for the further development of wind energy in Germany and Europe"

Berlin 23.01.2008. Today,the EU commission submitted its draft of a guideline for promoting renewable energy in Europe up until 2020. This is part of a comprehensive energy and climate protection package. The share of renewable energy for meeting power consumption demand across Europe is to be increased to 20% by 2020. Germany received a national target of 18% by 2020.

"The guideline provides a good basis with which Europe can reach the target of 20%. From our point of view, Germany can easily increase its share to 20%. However, meeting this target will require the right general conditions within Europe and Germany", says Hermann Albers, President of the BWE.

It is imperative that successful support programs, primarily the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG), are not jeopardized by the European framework regulation. The draft introduced today contains a clear rejection of a binding EU-wide system that would allow certificate trading between companies. Trading is only allowed between member states and only upon reaching their national intermediate targets. "In this case, the commission has addressed the concerns of many member states as well as the renewable energy sector. The originally planned European-wide certificate trading system would have hastily undermined the German EEG and compromised investment security for the industry. At the same time, costs for consumers and the industry would have increased significantly, similar to those we can already see today in countries using certificate models." The German federal government provided the commission with clear grounds illustrating the negative consequences for the EEG and intervened against the original model.

Today's proposed guideline places responsibility for achieving future targets in the hands of the member states: they decide on certificate trading measures, but only after they have first reached their intermediate targets. Several issues, however, must be considerably defined and improved within this context. Albers remains optimistic and believes this can be solved at the European level in the subsequent legislative process.

In addition to the other development in Brussels, the BWE (German Wind Energy Association) is focusing on the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) amendment scheduled for the coming months. "We will only reach our target in Germany by 2020 if we continue creating positive framework conditions for wind energy and in this country. Wind energy can cover 25% of the German electricity demand by the year 2020. However, to achieve this, the feed-in tariffs in the EEG, in particular repowering measures and new onshore installations must be adjusted to the severe fluctuations in the prices of raw material", says the President of the BWE.