The fracking ban in Germany is once again being questioned – especially by the FDP. Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck wants to stick to it. He would rather get gas from abroad than use his own resources. Will the gas treasure be raised after all?
It is one of the strictest fracking laws in the world, which the Bundestag and Bundesrat passed for Germany just over five years ago. The Fracking Prohibition Act of 2017 bans commercial unconventional fracking projects. The aim is to protect the environment and health from the risks of this technology. And that means: The approximately 2.3 trillion cubic meters of gas in Germany’s slate remain untouched – for the time being.
Because now the debate about the law is flaring up again. The Federal Republic is in an energy crisis due to the war started by Russia against Ukraine. Gas is becoming an increasingly scarce commodity. The problem: Germany obtains around half of the natural gas it needs from aggressor Russia. This must now be replaced, since a quarter of the energy required here is produced with natural gas.
The agreement between the Bundestag and Bundesrat provided for a ban on fracking until at least 2021. After five years, the Bundestag should then decide whether to stick with the regulations. If the Bundestag does nothing after this time, the ban will continue to apply, it was said at the time. To date, nothing has happened in this regard and the law stands.
Most recently, CSU boss Markus Söder and NRW Economics Minister Andreas Pinkwart (FDP) as well as the head of the German Economic Institute (IW), Michael Hüther, called for an open-ended examination of fracking. According to ” Welt am Sonntag “, the Professional Association of German Geoscientists (BDG) is also in favor of considering fracking in view of the energy crisis.
The FDP now wants to go ahead and, in view of the energy crisis, put the ban on natural gas production through fracking to the test. “As scientific studies show, fracking does not cause any relevant environmental damage under modern safety standards,” argues the parliamentary director of the FDP, Torsten Herbst, in the “Welt am Sonntag”. Anyone who imports fracking gas from the USA cannot be against safe fracking funding in Germany. “It should therefore be seriously examined whether larger shale gas production is feasible in Germany from an economic and technical point of view,” he says.
The energy policy spokesman for the FDP in the Bundestag, Michael Kruse, tells the newspaper that his party supports “the significant expansion of domestic natural gas production”. All options would have to be examined. “We have always rejected the content of the fracking ban law of 2017 from this straightforward position.”
So the FDP sees an energy gold mine in the German slate that needs to be unearthed. Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck, on the other hand, continues to reject the use of fracking. He refers to possible negative consequences for the environment and legal hurdles.
With the help of gas imports from Qatar and the USA, Habeck is trying to solve the energy problem in a different way. But he wasn’t able to organize a lot of gas. LPG is to come from the USA by ship, but it cannot yet be stored in Germany. There is simply a lack of special port terminals for this. The federal government is trying to build this in a hurry. The first few years are to be bridged with floating LNG terminals. But that costs a lot of money. In addition, the imported, liquefied LNG natural gas first has to be converted back into the gaseous state, which requires a lot of energy. Another idea of Habeck’s: He wants to support Israel in developing a gas field. In any case, one cannot attest to the economics minister’s refusal to work. But all of his projects have a problem: they might take too long.
In order to save gas, Habeck also wants to take additional measures, as can be seen from a four-point paper. The aim is to reduce the use of gas for power generation and industry and to promote the filling of storage facilities. The federal government is providing billions in funds for this purpose. In addition, more coal-fired power plants are to be used.
And so the 2.3 trillion cubic meters of gas deposits in the shale of their own country are back in focus. The amount would be sufficient to supply the country with natural gas for decades, says Hans-Joachim Kümpel, former President of the Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources, the “Welt am Sonntag”. As long as natural gas is needed in Germany, Kümpel said it would be a prank not to produce it. “An annual production volume of 20 billion cubic meters is possible for decades to come.” The volume corresponds to about half of the current natural gas supplies from Russia. “It would significantly reduce the blatant import dependency,” emphasizes the raw materials expert.
And the effort? The gas could be extracted from the shale rock in Germany within a year, says Mohammed Amro from the Bergakademie Freiberg in the newspaper. But the ban would have to be lifted first. In just five years, Germany could increase the production rate to such an extent that it could cover a fifth of its natural gas requirements with domestic fracking gas.
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So Germany is now at a crossroads – again. Forced by a war in Europe, a decision must be made whether to tap into your own gas resources and possibly accept damage, or to buy expensively and import resources from far away countries. The environmental aspect is already being torpedoed here. “The fact that we ultimately damage the climate by not producing domestic natural gas and accept substantial economic losses through foreign exchange payments is regrettable, if not irresponsible,” says Kümpel. According to the expert, experts have given up arguing against it.
