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The majority of Germans are not yet ready to accept the restrictions necessary for climate protection.

Only 15 percent are willing to fundamentally change their lifestyle.

This is a result of the international climate survey of the European Investment Bank (EIB), the second part of which WELT was exclusively available in advance.

For more than half of the people in Germany, climate change is still one of the greatest challenges.

This is the highest result in all European countries, despite a year marked by the corona pandemic.

"However, when it comes to individual actions of citizens, Germany does not do so well," the EIB found in the analysis of its survey of citizens of the European Union, the United States and China.

“The commitment of Germans to climate protection is no greater than anywhere else in Europe,” it continues.

Even more: "Only 15 percent of Germans state that they radically change their lifestyle in order to contribute as little as possible to climate change." That is "four percentage points less than the EU average."

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The Wuppertal Institute, among others, had calculated on behalf of the Fridays for Future movement what is necessary to achieve the CO2 reduction targets according to the Paris Climate Agreement.

Rapid changes in private consumer behavior would therefore be indispensable.

According to the Wuppertal study, car traffic should be halved by 2035 and the number of cars in cities should be reduced to a third of its current value.

The “termination of domestic German air traffic” is also necessary.

Many want to return to their old flight behavior

It is true that Germans would most likely give up flying in order to combat climate change - 39 percent after all.

Foregoing video streaming would only be the preferred method for 22 percent.

But according to the results of the EIB survey, only 50 percent of Germans are willing to steadily reduce the number of their air travel.

Another 26 percent would only want to do this “from time to time”.

Only one in ten Germans (eleven percent) will completely refrain from air travel even if the corona-related restrictions are lifted in order to protect the climate.

In contrast, 31 percent of Germans stated that they would “fully return to their previous travel behavior” after the end of the corona restrictions.

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Climate awareness appears to be more pronounced among the French and Poles: Here, only 24 and 19 percent, respectively, would return to their old travel habits.

Also, only 46 percent of the Germans surveyed would buy CO2 offsets, i.e. support tree-planting campaigns to offset the climate pollution caused by flying.

On average in the EU-27 there are significantly more people at 51 percent.

It is difficult to do without meat

And stop eating meat?

For Spaniards, according to the survey results, that would be almost as bad as not having to own a car.

Not so in Germany.

For 38 percent of Germans, giving up their own car would be the “toughest” climate protection measure.

For only 26 percent of Germans, it would be the most difficult to go without meat.

But overall, nutrition and climate protection are also difficult for many Germans.

"Germans are making less effort than the average European to combat climate change through their diet," notes the EIB.

67 percent of German respondents say that they are making efforts to combat climate change when it comes to food - and that is three percentage points less than the EU average.

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However, this does not only include avoiding meat, but also making an effort to buy regional products above all.

But the Germans also lag behind the Europeans in this discipline: 86 percent of those surveyed here buy seasonal products, 32 percent of them always.

But that is 13 percentage points less than the EU average of 45 percent.

With 15 to 19 year olds - perhaps unsurprisingly - 36 percent of those surveyed consider it the toughest climate protection measure if they had to do without the energy-intensive streaming of videos.

That is 21 percentage points above the German average across all age groups.

The Chinese are said to be particularly environmentally conscious

It is only natural to be more concerned about acute dangers than about future ones.

It therefore seems unsurprising that at 53 percent, more than half of Germans are more concerned about a Covid 19 infection than about the long-term consequences of climate change.

What is noticeable in the results of the EIB survey is that environmental awareness is apparently most pronounced in a country with the absolute largest emissions of CO2: China.

While in the EU an average of 66 percent of respondents are willing to reduce their meat consumption, in China it is as much as 74 percent.

80 percent of the Chinese also want to fly less, while only 74 percent of Europeans agree to do so.

Three out of four Chinese are willing to buy climate compensation, but only half of Europeans.

It is also comparatively easy for the Chinese to do without their own car. Giving up their own car would only be the toughest climate protection measure for 18 percent of Chinese, while this is the case for around 38 percent of Americans and Europeans. However, it cannot be ruled out that, due to the widespread bonus system for social good behavior there, Chinese citizens tend to give the answers in official surveys that are expected by the government.