The planned nationalization of Germany’s gas importer Uniper could open up completely new opportunities for domestic energy production. Desires are getting loud in Bavaria.
Munich (dpa / lby) – According to Environment Minister Thorsten Faithr, the Free State of Bavaria should in future generate renewable energies itself. “The brutal war of aggression in Ukraine shows that we have to rethink the energy supply of the future. We need a revolution in the energy sector,” said the Free Voter politician on Thursday in Munich. The triad must be: “From Bavaria, in Bavaria and for Bavaria. The central task is security of supply for people and the economy. In particular, the expansion of renewable energies must be significantly accelerated.”
Hydropower would be a good first step towards state energy supply. “The takeover of Uniper SE by the federal government currently offers the possibility of taking over hydroelectric power plants from Uniper Kraftwerks GmbH. In total, this involves 97 hydroelectric power plants with a total output of around 970 megawatts and around 4800 gigawatt hours of electricity per year in the power plant groups Danube, Isar, Lech and Main,” said Glauber. The hydroelectric power plants would generate around a third of Bavaria’s electricity production from hydropower.
Faithr is not alone in his demand: the Greens in the Bavarian state parliament have been campaigning for hydropower to be returned to the public sector for years. “The CSU sold off the crown jewels of Bavaria’s energy supply in the 1990s and 2000s: the hydroelectric power plants on the Danube, Lech, Isar and Main. Now there is a window of opportunity to rectify this error,” said parliamentary group leader Ludwig Hartmann. The power plants are now owned by the federal government. “We want to put them back in the hands of the people of Bavaria.”
