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Merkel left her nation reliant on Putin's gas and now councils are turning off hot water and threatening floodlights at football stadiums... but ROBERT HARDMAN reveals many fear there's far worse to come
A sunny day like this, hordes of children are jumping in and out of the water while pensioners dawdle up and down the slow lane. Few have noticed that this pool is a little chillier than usual.
These public baths, among the oldest in Germany’s second-largest city, Hamburg, are as popular as ever. No one seems bothered that the management have turned the thermostat down a few notches — from 28c to 25c to be precise.
What, though, will they think, as autumn gives way to winter, if the heating goes off altogether?
A couple of hours drive away, I find that the cafes are buzzing and the mood is happy enough in the pretty town of Oldenburg, near the Dutch border. But upstairs, in the grand old Town Hall, I find Mr Mayor carefully drawing up plans which, he hopes, might just help avert civil disorder this winter.
Jurgen Krogmann has his jacket off and his windows wide open. That is because he has had the air conditioning in every public building in town switched off. Now, he is looking ahead and trying to work out how to make more dramatic savings in the darker, colder months ahead.
We really need to start conserving energy now because we will need all we can get later in the year,’ says Mr Krogmann, who also sits on the board of his regional energy company, EWE.
He is the author of a punchy 30-point energy-saving plan which is now being adopted by town halls and councils all over Germany. His cumulative list of measures already includes a ban on hot water in public places, even schools.
Visit a loo anywhere in Oldenburg’s public domain from now on and you will find that there is only cold water with which to wash your hands.
No great sacrifice right now, of course, but this is just part of a very serious programme to acclimatise 83 million Germans to the fact that there is a monumental energy crisis coming down the track.
And, a few months from now, they may not merely be facing further eyewatering hikes in energy prices, just like consumers in Britain. Here in Germany, they are very worried there may be no energy at all.
And that poses serious threat of unrest, plus severe damage to Europe’s largest economy, one wholly dependent on its energy-guzzling manufacturing sector.
The principal cause is clear enough: the war in Ukraine and bad planning. For many years, the German government has built its economy on an assumption of indefinite quantities of cheap gas from Russia.
Angela Merkel may have been the darling of a gushing Western commentariat for all those years, but it is clear that her country is now paying the price for her reliance on Russian fuel in tandem with her decision to shut down Germany’s nuclear power industry.
This month, Russia has finally switched off the gas tap, citing pre-planned ‘maintenance’ issues with the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline. If it comes back on, as planned, on July 22, it probably won’t be for long. Everyone knows that President Putin’s overarching foreign policy strategy is to promote instability across the West.
Read more: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-11019179/ROBERT-HARDMAN-lights-Germany-winter.html
Merkel left her nation reliant on Putin's gas and now councils are turning off hot water and threatening floodlights at football stadiums... but ROBERT HARDMAN reveals many fear there's far worse to come
A sunny day like this, hordes of children are jumping in and out of the water while pensioners dawdle up and down the slow lane. Few have noticed that this pool is a little chillier than usual.
These public baths, among the oldest in Germany’s second-largest city, Hamburg, are as popular as ever. No one seems bothered that the management have turned the thermostat down a few notches — from 28c to 25c to be precise.
What, though, will they think, as autumn gives way to winter, if the heating goes off altogether?
A couple of hours drive away, I find that the cafes are buzzing and the mood is happy enough in the pretty town of Oldenburg, near the Dutch border. But upstairs, in the grand old Town Hall, I find Mr Mayor carefully drawing up plans which, he hopes, might just help avert civil disorder this winter.
Jurgen Krogmann has his jacket off and his windows wide open. That is because he has had the air conditioning in every public building in town switched off. Now, he is looking ahead and trying to work out how to make more dramatic savings in the darker, colder months ahead.
We really need to start conserving energy now because we will need all we can get later in the year,’ says Mr Krogmann, who also sits on the board of his regional energy company, EWE.
He is the author of a punchy 30-point energy-saving plan which is now being adopted by town halls and councils all over Germany. His cumulative list of measures already includes a ban on hot water in public places, even schools.
Visit a loo anywhere in Oldenburg’s public domain from now on and you will find that there is only cold water with which to wash your hands.
No great sacrifice right now, of course, but this is just part of a very serious programme to acclimatise 83 million Germans to the fact that there is a monumental energy crisis coming down the track.
And, a few months from now, they may not merely be facing further eyewatering hikes in energy prices, just like consumers in Britain. Here in Germany, they are very worried there may be no energy at all.
And that poses serious threat of unrest, plus severe damage to Europe’s largest economy, one wholly dependent on its energy-guzzling manufacturing sector.
The principal cause is clear enough: the war in Ukraine and bad planning. For many years, the German government has built its economy on an assumption of indefinite quantities of cheap gas from Russia.
Angela Merkel may have been the darling of a gushing Western commentariat for all those years, but it is clear that her country is now paying the price for her reliance on Russian fuel in tandem with her decision to shut down Germany’s nuclear power industry.
This month, Russia has finally switched off the gas tap, citing pre-planned ‘maintenance’ issues with the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline. If it comes back on, as planned, on July 22, it probably won’t be for long. Everyone knows that President Putin’s overarching foreign policy strategy is to promote instability across the West.
Read more: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-11019179/ROBERT-HARDMAN-lights-Germany-winter.html