At their meeting in Berlin, the environment ministers of the G7 countries set themselves ambitious goals. It's also about ending coal-based power generation.
Watch video 01:28
G7 countries commit to phasing out coal
At their meeting in Berlin, the climate, environment and energy ministers of the G7 states agreed for the first time to end climate-damaging coal-fired power plants. The states have concrete national implementation steps for this in the final communiqué of the ministerial meeting in Berlin guaranteed.
They commit to making the entire electricity sector largely CO2-free by 2035, which also excludes the use of gas-fired power plants. By 2030, the transport sector is supposed to get by at least to a large extent without fuel. The states want to largely stop subsidies for fossil fuels by 2025 and allow international financing of gas, oil or coal projects to expire this year.
More support for vulnerable countries
In the final declaration, the G7 states also undertake not to neglect climate protection, despite the difficult situation resulting from the war in Ukraine, but to push ahead with it. For the first time, they expressly recognize that they must provide more support to vulnerable countries in dealing with the damage and losses caused by climate change. In the communiqué, the G7 countries promise to use the so-called climate finance for measures to adapt developing countries to at least double global warming by 2025 together with other countries.
Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) admitted that the conference had a “common enemy”: “the status quo”. He emphasized: “No one here has to convince themselves that we are proud pioneers of climate protection. But we are trying to catch up on what has not gone well enough in the past – this also applies to climate financing.”
In addition, the G7 states had agreed that the World Conservation Conference should take place this year in order to place ocean protection even more at the center of G7 policy, said Federal Environment Minister Steffi Lemke. Marine protection is also necessary to combat the climate crisis.
USA and Germany want to be pioneers in climate protection and the energy transition
The climate, environment and energy ministers had been discussing in Berlin since Wednesday. At the beginning of the meeting, the main question was how the group of states can become independent of fossil energy imports from Russia as quickly as possible. At the beginning of the meeting, the German Economics and Energy Minister Habeck rejected calls for continued coal-fired power generation beyond 2030. Instead, he explained that the rich industrialized countries must play a certain pioneering role here. A strong signal from the G7 group could encourage other countries to get involved.
The lignite-fired power plant in Niederaussem near Cologne is scheduled to cease operations by 2038 at the latest
On the fringes of the meeting, Germany and the USA agreed to take a leading role internationally in order to set the framework for a successful energy transition to protect the climate. Habeck and the US government's climate commissioner, John Kerry, signed a corresponding declaration of intent. The focus is on the areas of hydrogen, offshore wind turbines, zero-emission vehicles and support for third countries.
There are “a lot of overlaps” between Germany and the USA in climate policy,” explained Habeck. The concrete implementation is about the governments creating the political framework for the economy in the energy transition. For example, it is “extremely important” for industry to cooperate on the future energy source hydrogen, “that the markets are coordinated” and that production is carried out according to common standards, according to the minister. Ensuring this is “the great task of the time”.
djo/pg/se (afp, dpa, epd)