Under the current conditions, the German coal industry does not see itself in a position to provide the additional power generation capacities desired by the federal government.

The perspective of only running until April next year is far too short and the link to the gas shortage is far too strict for the necessary investments to be worthwhile, said power plant operators, coal transporters and coal traders at a press conference by the Association of Coal Importers on Tuesday in Berlin.

Christian Geinitz

Business correspondent in Berlin

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In addition, the new regulations for storing supplies for 30 days of full-load operation on the power plant premises are exaggerated.

The replenishment of the reserves reduces the electricity production during this time considerably and, given a price of $300 per ton, ties up far too much capital.

Therefore, the power plants would have to be kept connected to the grid longer than planned, and there should also be financial compensation.

Due to the many obstacles, only two coal-fired power plants have returned to the market so far.

discrepancy of one year

Stephan Riezler from the energy supplier Steag, who is deputy chairman of the coal association, said his company was ready to take two power plants out of the grid reserve and to let two others that were actually supposed to go into the reserve continue to run.

“We plan to do that by November 1st.

But before a final decision can be made, the conditions mentioned must be met.” He doesn't want that to be taken as a threat, but says the government must ensure that the high investments and risks can be justified.

You cannot force the operators.

"The alternative is that the power plants do not return to the market and remain in reserve," said Riezler.

According to the new replacement power plant availability law and a corresponding ordinance, hard coal piles are to be taken from the reserve and at the same time such plants that are intended for the reserve can remain on the grid.

The responsible Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) is pursuing the intention that as little as possible of the currently valuable natural gas has to be used to generate electricity so that it is available where it cannot be replaced: for heating, for example, or for industry.

The law wants to keep the power plants that are actually to be taken off the grid available until spring 2024, but the current regulation only speaks of spring 2023, which is much too short from the point of view of the industry.

The discrepancy of one year was never explained, it said.

Habeck's house was also always informed about the difficulties to be expected and was therefore surprised at the versions of the law and ordinance that are now in force.

There is a lack of loading and unloading capacities

Steag manager Riezler considers public aid to be necessary for the pre-financing of the statutory coal stocks.

Discussions were already underway that a credit line would be made available through the KfW development bank.

The money is only needed for a few weeks and it doesn't burden the taxpayer, on the contrary.

The power plant operators paid higher interest rates than the federal government provided for refinancing: "Politics have also understood the issue in principle." Steag is negotiating a loan of 750 million euros for the return of the power plants to the market.

Association board member Dirk Gemmer from Rhenus Transport, who spoke for the transporters, made it clear that there was a lack of loading and unloading capacity for the coal, both at the seaports and inland.

In order to get this, you have to offer the providers longer-term perspectives than just a few months.

Transport within Germany, which is mainly carried out by inland waterway vessels, is suffering from the low water level, but also from a lack of ships, since the industry has adjusted to smaller quantities as part of the gradual phase-out of coal.

For example, 50 large spaceships were relocated to Ismail in the Ukraine in order to export grain from there.

Alexander Bethe, the chairman of the board of the association of coal importers, said that between 2016 and 2020 the import of steam coal to Germany halved to 20 million tons.

In 2021 it was 27 million tons again.

37 million are expected for 2022.

They have come to terms with the statutory phase-out of coal by 2038.

However, the industry considers it unrealistic that it will come as early as 2030, as the traffic light “ideally” wishes.