What Robert Habeck could and should have done long ago, he has now done.

Two of the three nuclear power plants still in production will remain connected to the grid after December 31st.

That was unclear until now, and no one knew how the power plants could be restarted technically during drafting.

Nor did anyone know why a decision on temporary continued operation had to be postponed.

Except, of course, that Habeck took the interests of the Federal Environment Ministry and Lower Saxony into account.

The FDP needs a trophy

Habeck justifies his switch to the results of the "stress test" - because the operators had recommended exactly what Habeck has now announced - with the bottlenecks in France.

This is not really convincing because the location of the nuclear power plants there has been known for a long time and has not changed on a large scale overnight.

But Habeck, when he says "France", maybe also thinks of the FDP.

The Liberals recently linked the end of the gas levy with continued operation of the nuclear power plants.

One has to do with the other somehow because it is about energy.

Above all, however, it is about the fact that the FDP urgently needs a trophy if their finance minister soon has to make compromises in order to finance a gas and electricity price brake.

Habeck meets the FDP

Habeck is accommodating with the FDP, but also with the SPD, whose chancellor recently had to fear that his authority and leadership image would begin to suffer permanently under the impression of adventurous half-heartedness (nuclear power) and rearguard action (gas levy).

It should now be easier for the coalition to find a successor to the unpopular gas surcharge.

Of course, all of this could and should have come much earlier.

Neither the election in Lower Saxony nor the mental balance of the Greens are reasons why the state should not know whether and how things will continue in winter.

The Greens, including those on the left, have harmed themselves: If a party so stubbornly puts its interests above the common good, even well-meaning voters stop having fun.