Grüne on climate and energy

The Greens want to make electricity permanently cheaper for companies. A Deutschlandfonds (Germany fund) would pay the fees for the long-distance transmission lines, and the electricity tax would fall to the lowest rate the EU allows. The platform calls a secure, clean and affordable energy supply a decisive factor for Germany as a business location.

The Greens want electricity to cost less. The state would pay the costs of the big power lines. The tax on electricity would drop a lot. This is meant to help companies in Germany.

The costs of the national transmission lines would be paid from the Deutschlandfonds, and the electricity tax would drop to the EU minimum. Companies would find it easier to generate their own power and to sign long-term purchase contracts. Electricity price compensation for energy-intensive firms facing global competition would be broadened. Energy efficiency measures would get more support. The core hydrogen network would be built quickly and according to demand; domestic production of green hydrogen would be subsidized and new import sources secured.

The Greens reject rolling back the European Green Deal or weakening climate targets. Instead, it would be expanded into a Clean Industrial Deal with an industrial policy coordinated at the European level. The platform argues that future technologies need stable conditions.

The EU has a plan for more climate protection. It is called the Green Deal. The Greens want to keep this plan. Climate goals should not get weaker. The EU should help industry make the change.

The Greens back the new EU Commission's planned expansion into a Clean Industrial Deal. The next EU budget framework would create instruments for a coordinated industrial policy and fund them. EU state aid rules would be changed so that, in the short term, they do not block broad support for moving industry to climate neutrality. The same applies to reducing dependence on autocratic states. Europe would thus become the market leader in sustainable electrical engineering, chemicals, machinery and services.

The Greens want to support industry in becoming climate neutral and keep it in Germany. They rely on the carbon price, targeted investment support, more Klimaschutzverträge (climate protection contracts) and guaranteed demand for climate-neutral products.

The Greens want to help industry protect the climate. Factories should stay in Germany. The state should pay companies that save a lot of CO₂. The state should also buy climate-friendly steel itself.

Klimaschutzverträge are state funding contracts that offset the extra cost of climate-friendly production. They would cover more areas and be tied to a commitment to stay in the location and to collectively agreed wages. Green lead markets for steel and cement would be set up across Europe, for example through a rising minimum quota for green steel in public contracts. Companies, especially small and mid-sized ones, would get help switching from fossil to electricity-based heat.

The Greens want to permit capturing, storing and using CO₂ where industrial emissions are hard to avoid. Uniform Europe-wide rules and shared infrastructure would be created for this.

Some factories cannot fully avoid CO₂. The Greens want to allow capturing and storing CO₂ there. The CO₂ must be stored safely. Europe should get shared rules and storage sites for this.

The condition is safe and stable storage or use within closed carbon cycles. In principle, polluters are to pay. A European legal framework with binding liability and shared European storage sites are planned. Protected areas and their immediate surroundings stay excluded, and existing uses at sea and ecological criteria are taken into account. Negative emissions would be researched and given their own targets, without counting them against the reduction targets of emissions trading.

The Greens want to protect households from having their electricity or heating cut off. Electricity bills are to become easier to understand, and district heating is to get nationwide price oversight.

The Greens want to protect people who pay for power and heating. Nobody should simply have their power or heat cut off. Power bills should be easier to read. The state should check prices for district heating.

Electricity bills would in future show the average electricity price and the price range offered to new customers. This is meant to let customers see whether their old contract is too expensive and whether switching pays off. The platform calls this a brake on expensive electricity rates. For district heating, nationwide price oversight and more transparent price calculations by suppliers are meant to guard against excessive costs.

The Greens oppose weakening the European Green Deal and the 'Fit for 55' legislative package. European emissions trading for transport and buildings is to start as planned. Businesses need planning certainty, the platform says.

The Greens want to keep the EU's climate laws. These laws are called the Green Deal. Nobody should make them weaker. Emitting CO₂ should have a price in the EU, also for transport and buildings.

The laws are to be implemented consistently across Europe with as little red tape as possible. The Greens back the Clean Industrial Act and the introduction of the emissions trading systems on schedule; the platform sees the carbon price as a central lever. Europe is to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by at least 90 to 95 percent by 2040 compared with 1990. As tools, the platform names market incentives, targeted funding, and regulation.

The Greens want to stick to the goal of climate neutrality by 2045 and to the interim targets. Under the Climate Protection Act, individual sectors are to be held more accountable again if they are projected to miss their targets.

Germany should be climate neutral by 2045. The Greens want to stick to that. Every ministry should have to act in its own area. More should happen in transport: more rail and more electric cars.

The Council of Experts on Climate Change is to get a stronger role. If a sector is projected to miss its targets over the longer term, binding corrective action is to follow there; each ministry is to carry out its own measures even if the overall balance is on track. The platform justifies this with the risk of penalty payments and higher carbon prices. In transport, where the gap is said to be largest, rail expansion and the shift to electric mobility are to move faster. The climate effects of food are also to be considered, for example by supporting a more plant-based diet.

The Greens want to expand funding programs for climate-friendly investments and scale them more strongly by income. People with low or middle incomes are to get more support. Investments in climate neutrality are to be financed partly through borrowing.

Climate protection costs money, for example for a new heating system. The Greens want to help people pay for it. People who earn little should get more help. The state should also be allowed to borrow money for this.

As examples, the platform names new heating systems, insulation, energy storage, and switching to an electric car. Groups and regions that are especially burdened are to get targeted support. Municipalities, local utilities, and small businesses are also to get suitable funding programs, for instance for electric buses. A predictable budget policy is meant to ensure that funding is reliably available. The platform regards the financing as a task for generations, which is its reason for partly funding it through debt.

The Greens want to spend revenue from the carbon price on heating and transport on socially fair climate action. Most of it would be paid out as Klimageld (a climate payment) to people with low and middle incomes.

Heating and fuel cost more because of the carbon price. The state earns money from this. The Greens want to give this money back. People with low or middle incomes should get a climate payment.

The Klimageld is to start as quickly as possible in the next legislative term and arrive in bank accounts without an application. It is to grow in step with carbon pricing revenue. For people with low incomes, the platform says it will usually more than offset their carbon costs. The Greens also plan a program for one million balconies that helps people with lower incomes buy plug-in solar devices. Existing support for replacing heating systems and renovating homes is to continue.

The Greens want those who cause climate damage to pay for it. They name the super-rich and oil and gas companies, which are to contribute to covering the costs.

The climate crisis causes high costs. The Greens say: whoever causes the damage should pay. They mean very rich people and oil and gas companies. Coal companies should pay for later damage themselves.

The platform argues that the richest one percent of humanity emits more than twice as much greenhouse gas as the poorer half. Citizens, farmers and businesses should not be left alone with growing damage. In Germany, coal companies are to secure the long-term follow-up costs of mining so the public does not pay. Internationally, the party wants to work for climate justice.

The Greens want to keep up the pace of renewable energy expansion. Renewables are to supply 80 percent of electricity by 2030, and power generation is to be fully climate-neutral in 2035.

Electricity should come from wind, sun and water. By 2030 this should be 80 percent. In 2035 all electricity should be climate-neutral. People should find it easier to use and share their own power.

According to the platform, about 60 percent of electricity came from renewable sources in 2024, up from 40 percent in 2021. Owners, tenants, companies and municipalities are to use their own energy or join projects with little red tape. The party wants to support decentralized solar and wind plants, storage and electrolyzers through less bureaucracy and reliable conditions. Energy sharing is to make it simpler to share green power within communities and municipalities. The infrastructure is also to be protected against attacks.

The Greens want to better match electricity supply and demand because wind and sun deliver unevenly. New market rules, grid expansion, storage, digital grids and hydrogen-ready power plants are to contribute.

Wind and sun do not always deliver the same amount of power. So the Greens want to change the power market. They want to build more lines and storage. People should use power when it is cheap.

The plan includes capacity markets for power plant investment, combined with short-term incentives for efficient consumption; the party wants to examine regional energy markets. New plants are to run on green hydrogen as soon as possible, and biogas plants mainly on waste and residues. Dynamic rates and digital grids are to let households store power or charge their electric car when wind and sun are plentiful. The European internal electricity market and lines to neighboring countries are to be strengthened. For new direct-current lines, the party wants to check whether overhead lines instead of underground cables cut costs without delaying construction.

The Greens want to make electricity cheaper for households and businesses. The electricity tax is to drop to the minimum rate allowed in the EU, and a new way of financing grid expansion is to lower grid fees.

Electricity should get cheaper. The Greens want to cut the electricity tax sharply. Fees for the power grid should also go down. This should ease the burden on people and companies.

The platform wants to cover power system costs in other ways rather than passing them on to consumers. As an example it cites the EEG surcharge for renewables, which is already paid from the federal budget. Grid fees are to stay limited and be shared fairly. The party wants to lower financing costs through stable conditions, guarantees, higher grid utilization and peak-load capping. Affordable energy is to be secured in the future as well.

The Greens want no coal-fired power plant running in Germany from 2030 on, and coal mining is to end as well. This is meant to give coal regions planning certainty and allow an orderly structural transition.

The Greens want to stop burning coal from 2030 on. Coal mining should end then too. Coal regions should be able to plan safely. The state should support them during the change.

The platform calls fossil energy a thing of the past and wants to take this position at the EU level too. The phase-out covers all remaining coal plants and domestic coal mining. The party justifies the fixed date with reliability for the regions affected. Structural change there is to be supported in an orderly way.

The Greens want to reduce the use of fossil gas step by step and end it by 2045 at the latest. New projects to extract oil and natural gas are no longer to be approved in Germany.

The Greens want to use less and less natural gas. It should end by 2045 at the latest. No one should start new drilling for oil or gas in Germany. Green hydrogen and renewable energy should replace gas.

The party announces a plan for a gas independence strategy that takes effects on climate, society, the economy and industry into account. It considers new long-term gas import contracts incompatible with the climate targets. LNG infrastructure is to be reviewed continuously with European partners to see whether it is needed, to avoid lasting dependence on gas. The rejection of oil and gas extraction applies on land and at sea and is to apply worldwide as soon as possible. Upstream emissions are to be taken into account.

The Greens reject a return to nuclear power, citing the unresolved waste storage question, the costs and the risk of weapons-grade material spreading. Fuel element production and uranium enrichment in Germany are also to end.

The Greens want no more nuclear power plants. They find nuclear power too dangerous and too costly. Factories for nuclear fuel in Germany should close too. A safe storage site should be found for nuclear waste.

In the platform's view, nuclear power is needed neither for the climate targets nor for security of supply. The party sees the planned involvement of the Russian company Rosatom at the Lingen site as an added security risk. It points to its push for tougher European sanctions, also because of the danger of espionage and sabotage. The search for a final repository is to proceed quickly and with public participation. Until then, interim storage sites are to be operated safely.

The Greens stand by the Gebäudeenergiegesetz (building energy law) and the subsidy of up to 70 percent for fossil-free heating systems and want to expand support. Together with municipalities, everyone is to be able to switch gradually to climate-neutral, affordable heating.

The Greens want heating to stop harming the climate. The heating law should stay. People who install climate-friendly heating get money from the state. The Greens want to increase this help.

The law and the subsidy are meant to give owners, tenants, landlords and businesses planning certainty until 2045. Municipal utilities and companies are to get help offering heat contracting, which spares owners the high upfront investment; consumer rights are to be protected. The party wants to expand energy advice and secure its independence, and to strengthen the climate component in housing benefits. The platform sees no prospect for hydrogen in heating. CO₂ from burning wood is to count fully in emissions trading.

The Greens want to expand heating networks, convert them to renewable heat, and extend and increase federal funding for this. District heating customers are to be better protected, first through price oversight and later through price regulation.

District heating brings heat through pipes to many homes at once. The Greens want to build more of these networks. The heat should be climate-friendly. The state should check district heating prices.

The platform sees heating networks as useful mainly in densely populated areas and at suitable rural sites. Permits are to become simpler, and lower electricity costs are to help local suppliers. Private capital is to be mobilized for expansion, and public guarantees are to make financing cheaper. The party wants to support cooperatives in which citizens jointly finance and shape their heat supply. Third-party providers are to get easier access to district heating networks.

The Greens want to make climate action and adaptation to climate impacts a task that the federal government and the states pay for together, because municipalities carry most of the burden. Flood protection, disaster response and the protection of cities against heat and heavy rain are to be expanded.

The climate is changing. There is more heat and more flooding. The Greens want to protect people better. The federal government and the states should pay for this together. Cities should get more green space and more room for water.

Funding programs such as the Action Program for Natural Climate Protection are to grow, and municipalities are to get more money for projects and staff. For flood protection the party relies on natural floodplains and restored rivers, but also on dikes and retention systems; such measures are to be carried out with priority and faster. Insurance against natural hazard damage is to be extended in a socially acceptable way. Cities are to become sponge cities through unsealing soil, greenery, fresh-air corridors and drinking fountains, storing water and providing cooling. According to the platform, fighting the causes keeps priority over adaptation.

The Greens want to end oil extraction in German waters and gas extraction in Germany by 2035 and to draw up a roadmap for it. They reject gas drilling off Borkum because, in the platform's view, it endangers the Wadden Sea.

The Greens want Germany to stop pumping oil and gas. This should end by 2035. Nobody should drill for gas near the island of Borkum. The Greens want to protect the Wadden Sea this way.

A roadmap with the target year 2035 is to be drawn up for the phase-out. The platform describes the Wadden Sea as a highly productive ecosystem that serves porpoises, seals, migratory birds, and fish as habitat and food source. Gas drilling near Borkum should therefore not go ahead.

The Greens want Germany and Europe to contribute their share of international climate finance in line with the decisions of the climate conferences. Climate diplomacy and partnerships are to support other countries on the path to climate neutrality; the program sees the climate crisis as a major security risk.

The Greens want to advance climate protection around the world. Germany and Europe should give money to other countries for this. Poor and badly affected countries should get special help. International banks should stop funding coal, oil and gas.

New instruments are to be used for financing, and investment and trade are to be aligned with climate neutrality and the 2030 Agenda. Multilateral banks are to withdraw from fossil fuels. Special support is to go to heavily affected states, especially in Africa and small island states, and the rights of indigenous peoples are to be strengthened. Climate and biodiversity protection are to be linked more closely, for instance in protecting ecosystems that store CO₂. Existing climate and energy partnerships are to be supplemented by technology partnerships with German companies.