Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) considers a power failure in winter to be unlikely. He was “very sure that we will be spared that,” said Scholz on Sunday in the ZDF “summer interview”. “We have done everything to ensure that it does not come to that.”
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CDU leader Friedrich Merz had previously warned of such a “blackout” if the traffic light coalition adhered to the phase-out of nuclear energy.
If only every fifth gas customer heats with electricity this winter, the electricity demand of private households will double, said Merz. “If this government continues like this and sticks to the nuclear phase-out for ideological reasons, we are threatened with a blackout at the beginning of next year.”
Merz called for the ordering of new fuel rods for the continued operation of at least the three nuclear power plants in Germany that have not yet been shut down: “We would have made sure by August at the latest that new fuel rods would have been ordered at least for the three nuclear power plants that are still running, possibly also for the three , which were decommissioned in the last year. This would initially provide a total of 20 million households with a secure supply of electricity.”
Because of the energy crisis, which has been exacerbated by the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine, there has been a debate for months as to whether the three remaining nuclear power plants should run longer, even though their power operation authorization expires at the end of the year.
The federal government consisting of the SPD, Greens and FDP is currently testing the security of the power supply in a stress test. Then she wants to decide whether the nuclear power plants will run a little longer.
Furthermore, Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) promised that the planned electricity price brake would come into force as soon as possible. “We have to make a lot of decisions and enforce a lot of regulations for this to succeed. The first is that we skim off the chance profits that are now being made on the electricity market,” said Scholz on Sunday in the ZDF summer interview.
