The dispute within the traffic light coalition on energy policy has flared up again.

If Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) and Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) expected to be able to end the nuclear power debate with the FDP with a word of power, they were wrong.

After Transport Minister Volker Wissing (FDP) initially called for a scientific reassessment of nuclear energy, his parliamentary group is now following suit.

She doubts a central report on security of supply and the feasibility of the energy transition without coal and nuclear power, which Habeck's house commissioned.

Christian Geinitz

Business correspondent in Berlin

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"This monitoring report describes a political wish concert and not a realistic analysis of the development," criticized the energy policy spokesman for the Liberals in the Bundestag, Michael Kruse, to the FAZ "The past year has shown that energy policy is based on facts and not on the basis of dreams must be," he said, referring to the need to operate individual coal and nuclear power plants longer because of the discontinued gas supplies from Russia.

Kruse referred to the "Report on the status and development of security of supply in the area of ​​electricity supply", which is being coordinated by the ministries and is scheduled to go through the Federal Cabinet on Wednesday next week.

It was developed by the Federal Network Agency.

The paper is available to the FAZ as well as the "Recommendations for action by the federal government to ensure security of supply with electricity" derived from it in January.

“As an industrial nation, we need a risk buffer”

Kruse said that the provision of energy for the population and the economy should never come under pressure again due to inadequate precautions: "As an industrial nation, we need a risk buffer.

Now is the right time to discuss and reverse the wrongly chosen phase-out sequence for nuclear and coal power.” SPD and Greens want to shut down the last three nuclear reactors in the spring and bring forward the phase-out of coal from 2038 to 2030.

That has already been agreed for West Germany, while the East is still resisting the eight-year reduction.

Kruse complained that the report is based on an "unreal best-case scenario".

The results will only come about if all assumptions are fully met, which is unlikely: "Good weather reports do not contribute to a climate-friendly, secure and affordable energy policy."

In the paper, it says in the spirit of Habeck: "The secure supply of electricity is guaranteed in the period 2025 to 2031, even with a complete phase-out of coal by 2030." The nuclear phase-out is assumed anyway.

However, Kruse points out that, even in the opinion of the authors, the supply will only succeed if the capacity of new wind and solar parks, including the replacement of old systems, is three times as high every year as has been the case up to now.

It is questionable whether this will succeed.

In addition, the early phase-out of coal and the expansion of renewables required faster optimization and expansion of the grids - although line construction is largely stagnating.

The fluctuations in green electricity are currently being compensated for by coal and nuclear power plants.

In the future, the report considers new natural gas power plants to be necessary, which are later to run with "green" hydrogen.

However, the study admits that there is still “uncertainty” about its production, transport and import.

In addition, the gas and hydrogen investors needed “long-term stable framework conditions”.

Which assumptions will be fulfilled?

The authors discovered this predictability, among other things, in the support provided by the Renewable Energy Sources Act.

On the other hand, Kruse is opposed to the fact that the EEG funding will end parallel to the phase-out of coal.

A stumbling block in financing from the market is that expensive gas-fired power plants are only worthwhile for financiers if they are remunerated for the reserve function instead of electricity generation.

However, such “capacity markets” do not exist in Germany.

Kruse sums it up: "Long-term conditions are assumed that are not already foreseeable."

In his opinion, the report builds not least on foreign countries, namely on investments there in both renewable and conventional energies.

13 of the 27 EU countries operate nuclear power plants, in three new reactors are under construction, in others planned, including Poland.

"We are relying on our neighboring countries for the planned bottlenecks at home and that, unlike us, they have sufficient risk provisions in place," said the FDP politician.

"That would be European solidarity as a one-way street." The report considers bottlenecks not only in generation but also in transport to be possible if the network does not grow as required.

The euphemism for this is “transmission challenge”.

Kruse refers to the insight from the text,

The FDP's skepticism about the report is supported by the opposition, of all people.

"Many requirements are defined in the report, of which I do not see one being met by 2030," said Jens Spahn (CDU), vice-chairman of the Union faction.

The assumed tripling of the expansion of renewables to 300 gigawatts (GW) is unrealistic, since almost all tenders for solar and wind power have been signed.

The required expansion of 20 GW of gas power plants is also not in sight, there is currently not a single project.

"The finding of the report that there will be no problem in the energy supply by 2030 is not sustainable," said Spahn in agreement with Kruse.