CDU on climate and energy

The CDU wants to make Hesse the leading location for eco-tech research and relies on innovation rather than bans for climate and nature protection. Universities should be able to research energy questions without being tied to particular technologies.

The CDU wants to protect the climate with new technology. It thinks bans are the wrong way. Hesse should lead in research on green technology. Companies from this field should come to Hesse. Universities should be free to research all energy technologies.

The program wants to attract companies in green technologies and support start-ups in that field. Green tech is to become part of the "Houses of" strategy, which brings research, business and politics together. With energy security and the energy transition in mind, universities are to research without a commitment to specific technologies. As an example of a start-up worth funding, the CDU names "Focused Energy," which is backed by TU Darmstadt.

The CDU wants to promote energy-efficiency upgrades of owner-occupied homes through incentives and help people save energy. It rejects mandatory renovations as proposed at EU level, calling them a disproportionate intrusion on owners' rights.

The CDU wants to help homeowners save energy. There should be incentives, for example for upgrading a house. The CDU does not want a duty to renovate. The EU proposes such duties. The CDU thinks this is too hard on owners.

The incentives aim to get owners to upgrade the energy performance of their houses and apartments and thereby lower their energy bills. The rejection targets proposals from Brussels for renovation obligations. The party justifies this with the rights of property owners.

The CDU wants to launch a state funding program for energy-related measures in buildings. At the federal level, it wants the earlier subsidy scheme for the Efficiency Standard 55 to be extended by five years.

The CDU wants to give money for energy-saving homes. People who insulate their house get support. This also applies to solar panels. The federal government should keep paying its old subsidy for new buildings longer.

Eligible measures would include insulating exterior walls, roofs, top-floor ceilings and basement ceilings, as well as replacing windows. Photovoltaic systems, plug-in mini solar units, high-efficiency pumps with sludge filters, and energy checks by the consumer advice center are also listed. Federally, the CDU wants the subsidy rules for Efficiency Standard 55 that applied until the previous year to be extended by five years, with stricter requirements only afterward. The program argues that the federal government brought construction to an abrupt halt.

The CDU rejects the federal government's heating law and a ban on gas and oil heating systems. It wants to modernize heating through incentives and technology-neutral solutions instead. Heating with wood and biomass should remain allowed, including in new buildings.

The CDU is against the federal heating law. It does not want bans on gas and oil heaters. It prefers to offer incentives. Heating with wood should stay allowed.

The program calls the federal law the wrong approach because, in the CDU's view, a sudden ban cannot be carried out in practice and is unaffordable for many. It says the law causes rejection and uncertainty. The CDU relies on incentives and openness to different technologies. As a heavily forested state, Hesse is to promote heat from wood, pellets and other biomass, explicitly also in new buildings.

The CDU commits to making Hesse climate-neutral by 2045 and to meeting the agreed interim steps. The state's climate law is to be adapted to changed federal rules, which means fixed sector targets will be dropped.

Hesse should be climate-neutral by 2045. That means Hesse will no longer harm the climate. The CDU wants to change the state's climate law. There will be no more fixed goals for single areas. The state's own offices should be climate-neutral by 2030.

According to the platform, climate measures should be carried out only if they are ecologically sustainable, economically and socially acceptable, technology-neutral and neutral toward competition. Because the federal government is abolishing binding sector targets, the CDU says Hesse can no longer use them either, though all sectors should still contribute appropriately. At the state level, the CDU relies on information, networking, funding and incentives and wants to keep supporting climate-committed municipalities. The state administration is to become net greenhouse-gas neutral by 2030 and serve as a model in buildings, mobility and procurement.

The CDU rejects the federal government's planned de facto ban on new gas and oil heating systems as well as a blanket ban on cars with combustion engines. It also rejects building renovation mandates planned at the EU level.

The CDU is against a ban on new gas and oil heating. It is also against a ban on cars with combustion engines. The EU plans rules that force owners to renovate homes. The CDU rejects that too. It says bans make climate protection unpopular.

In the platform's view, blanket bans do not fit people's everyday lives, provoke resistance and weaken support for climate protection. The CDU calls the renovation rules planned at the European level a disproportionate interference with owners' rights. Instead, it wants to help businesses and citizens meet the requirements efficiently.

The CDU regards European emissions trading as the central tool of climate policy and supports extending it to buildings and transport. In the long run, it aims for a single CO2 price across all sectors throughout Europe.

Those who emit CO2 must buy permits. This is called emissions trading. The CDU wants to expand this system in Europe. It should also cover buildings and transport. In the end, all of Europe should have one CO2 price.

Under the platform, CO2 emissions are to be steered by a market mechanism at the EU level, in a technology-neutral and competition-neutral way. The CDU sees the inclusion of buildings and transport with a firm cap (ETS2) as a guarantee that these sectors meet their targets. A cross-sector permit market is meant to ensure that the cheapest way of avoiding CO2 prevails. Europe is thus to become the world's first climate-neutral region, by 2045 if possible.

The CDU relies on technical solutions rather than doing without when it comes to climate protection. It wants to launch a special program for climate technologies, advance carbon capture and storage, and expand natural carbon sinks.

The CDU wants to protect the climate with technology. People should not have to give things up. The state should invest in new climate technology. It should be possible to capture and store CO2. Forests and bogs should also absorb more CO2.

With the special program "High-Tech-for-Climate," the state would invest together with universities and companies in researching, developing and bringing climate technologies to market. The CDU expects the federal government to improve the legal basis for CCS and CCU, meaning capturing CO2 and storing or using it, and to start international cooperation. Carbon Contracts for Difference are to be used intensively and made easily accessible to small and medium-sized companies. Carbon storage in forests, bogs and soils is to be expanded through incentives. The CDU also wants to keep nuclear expertise in research and oversight in Hesse.

The CDU wants to keep supporting hydrogen and fuel cell technology and turn Hesse into a lead market. To that end, filling stations and infrastructure are to be expanded and cooperation with other states stepped up.

The CDU wants to support hydrogen more. Hydrogen is a gas that can provide energy. Hesse should become a leading market for it. There should be more hydrogen filling stations. Skilled workers for climate protection should be well trained.

Hydrogen alliances are to help launch the market and bring investment in hydrogen filling stations and charging infrastructure. The platform puts a focus on small combined heat and power units with fuel cells, with infrastructure to be built first in the dense metropolitan area. In promoting vocational training and skilled trades, the CDU wants to pay particular attention to workers needed for climate measures. Climate education is to continue and, in the party's view, be taught in a science-based and non-ideological way.

The CDU wants to prepare Hesse for the consequences of global warming with a "climate adaptation offensive." Plans include investment in flood and extreme-weather protection, precautions against power outages, and help for farming and forestry.

The climate is getting warmer. The CDU wants to prepare Hesse for this. The state should spend more on protection from floods and storms. There should be emergency points for power outages. Farmers and forest owners should also get help.

Existing research units are to be linked up and the KLIMPRAX projects expanded to prepare all levels of government for weather-related disasters. The state wants to support municipalities and private investors in making infrastructure climate-ready; a climate impact fund for municipalities is considered possible. Private precautions are to get their own funding program, and decentralized emergency contact points are to help during power outages. For farmers, the CDU plans to promote multi-peril insurance and research into climate-adapted crop varieties. Together with the Frankfurt financial center, insurance solutions for international climate damage are also to be developed.

The CDU announces an "energy offensive" that rules out no technology for generating energy. Hesse is to become a leading location for energy research, especially for laser-driven nuclear fusion.

The CDU wants research on all kinds of energy. No technology should be ruled out from the start. Hesse should lead in energy research. Nuclear fusion matters most to the CDU. In fusion, atomic nuclei merge and release energy.

According to the platform, new clean energies should break through not by state mandates but through funding for research and technology. A cluster of excellence called "Saubere Energie 2040" (Clean Energy 2040) is to be set up at the House of Energy, studying geothermal energy, vertical wind turbines, agricultural and floating solar, storage, molten salt reactors and transmutation plants, among others. Fusion research in Darmstadt is to be stepped up. At the federal level, the CDU wants fusion research removed from the scope of the Atomic Energy Act. It also stresses a "no blackout policy": restructuring the energy supply must not endanger security of supply.

The CDU wants to push for keeping the most recently shut-down nuclear power plants as a strategic reserve for the time being rather than dismantling them. It cites security of supply and stable prices during the energy crisis.

Germany has shut down its last nuclear power plants. The CDU does not want them taken apart yet. They should stay ready as a reserve. The CDU says this helps keep power secure and prices stable.

In the platform's view, the plants can contribute to base load, security of supply and stable prices during the energy and price crisis. The CDU calls the shutdown irresponsible given the situation at the time. Technology neutrality also means, it says, allowing research in this field in Germany.

The CDU wants to expand power grids at all levels, advance energy storage and speed up permits for power lines. Local and district heating as well as energy efficiency are also to be increased.

The CDU wants more power lines to be built. Permits for them should come faster. It should be easier to store electricity. Storage should face fewer charges. There should also be more district heating.

Regulatory hurdles for storage such as power-to-gas, power-to-liquid and batteries are to be removed; the CDU expects the federal government to relieve storage of fees, levies and taxes. For long-distance lines, upstream regional planning procedures should be skipped where possible, and upgrading lines to high-temperature conductors should be allowed in a fast-track process. Heating networks are to grow, and waste heat from industry and data centers is to be put to better use. The "Bioenergie-Dorf" (bioenergy village) competition is to be relaunched, and the CDU wants to promote energy efficiency through advice and start-up funding.

The CDU wants to advance energy savings in households, buildings and businesses through more advice and funding. It intends to lobby the federal government for a scrappage bonus for old large household appliances.

The CDU wants people and companies to use less energy. There should be more advice for this. People who swap an old appliance for an efficient one should get money. The federal government should pay for this.

The grant for replacing an appliance would apply if the new, highly efficient device saves at least 30 percent energy. Low-income households are to receive more intensive advice and be relieved of high costs through funding offers. Together with private partners and consumer advice centers, energy consulting for existing buildings is to grow; vouchers are meant to pay for checks of existing buildings for economically viable savings. With industry and small and mid-sized firms, the CDU wants more advice and knowledge transfer and wider use of Carbon Contracts for Difference (state climate protection contracts).

The CDU wants to lobby the federal government for a support model called "PrivatPlusEnergie" to follow the electricity price brake. People who generate and use their own green power would also get a benefit on the rest of their electricity use.

Some people make their own power, for example with solar panels. The CDU wants to reward these people. They should also get help with the rest of their power. The CDU wants to push for this at the federal level.

The model is meant to reward private involvement in energy generation more strongly. Tenant electricity and contracting models would also be covered by the support. In a second stage, the CDU wants to extend the model to industrial companies.

The CDU wants to expand solar energy on roofs, commercial sites, along transport routes, over parking lots and in part over farmland and water. A 100,000-roofs program with cheap or interest-free loans plus lower taxes and less red tape is meant to make solar the norm.

The CDU wants many more solar panels in Hesse. They should go on roofs, parking lots and next to highways. There should be cheap loans for 100,000 roofs. People should pay no taxes on solar power they use themselves.

One percent of the state's area is to be available for solar under the state energy law, with dual uses such as rooftops taking priority. The loan program is to cover facades as well; the solar registry will continue and be extended to open and converted land. The CDU wants to pair federal or EU solar mandates with tax incentives and let owners choose alternative energy sources. Heritage protection limits on solar installations are to be reduced. For ground-mounted systems, the annual expansion cap of 35 megawatts is to rise significantly, while the restriction to agriculturally disadvantaged areas stays in principle. Agri-photovoltaics, panels on noise barriers and a test stretch of solar roofing over a highway are also planned.

The CDU wants to keep expanding wind energy in Hesse in a way that fits the landscape and has public acceptance, and to shorten procedures considerably. At the same time it criticizes the federal government for requiring more than the two percent of land agreed in 2011.

The CDU wants more wind turbines in Hesse. Permits should come faster. Old turbines should be replaceable with new ones. But the CDU is unhappy about a federal rule on land area.

To reach the federally required 2.2 percent of state land, areas that already have turbines are above all to be designated as priority areas for repowering, meaning replacing old turbines with new ones. An additional infrastructure panel is to be created at the state's higher administrative court to ease the caseload. The CDU wants to lobby the federal government for accelerated "super" depreciation on investments in wind power and other renewables. In the platform's view, the federal requirement runs counter to federalism and closeness to citizens.

The CDU wants to make greater use of geothermal heat, both near the surface and from great depth. Legal and bureaucratic obstacles are to be removed, especially in the Upper Rhine Rift with its favorable geology.

The CDU wants to use more heat from the ground. This is called geothermal energy. There should be fewer rules for it. It works especially well in the Upper Rhine Rift.

For near-surface geothermal energy, a balance is to be struck between opportunities for use and precautionary rules in water law. For deep geothermal energy, the CDU wants to lay geological and planning foundations and reduce obstacles in mining, building and water law. It wants to push for such plants to get priority in building law similar to wind turbines. In research, it seeks cooperation with networks in Rhineland-Palatinate and Baden-Württemberg.

The CDU wants to preserve and promote biogas, heating with wood and hydropower as renewable energy sources. It rejects additional requirements and new taxes on earnings at the federal level.

The CDU wants to keep supporting energy from manure and plants. Heating with wood should stay too. Small hydropower plants and old mills will keep getting money. The CDU does not want new strict rules for this.

Manure, slurry, residues and energy crops are to be used more for energy; gas collection pipelines and feeding gas into the natural gas grid are to be made easier. For biogas, the CDU calls for fair payment models. Wood from Hesse's forests is to be available as fuel, and the EU should recognize wood and forest residues as sustainable. On hydropower, the platform seeks a balance between water and fish protection and energy generation and continues funding for small plants.

The CDU wants to keep supporting and to expand energy production from agricultural biomass and biogas. At the federal level it advocates fair payment models and opposes additional taxes on earnings.

Manure, slurry and plants can be turned into energy. The CDU wants to use this more. Farmers should be paid fairly for it. There should be no new taxes on the earnings. Biogas should get into the gas grid more easily.

Manure, slurry and residues are to be used more for energy, together with purpose-grown biomass. The CDU wants to remove red tape and limits on farm subsidies where possible. Conditions for gas collection pipelines and for feeding biogas into the natural gas grid are to improve in order to strengthen linked systems. At the federal level the party wants fair payment models and no additional taxes on earnings.