After an intense five days, negotiators from Angela Merkel’s conservative bloc and the rival center-left SPD have sent out the white smoke and emerged with a draft coalition document they say can serve as the basis of cooperation.
Climate activists immediately skipped to the page dealing with Germany’s future emissions reduction targets. Earlier in the week, negotiators had tentatively agreed to delay 2020 emissions reduction targets which Germany is not on course to meet.
But in the agreement text to come out of this week’s negotiations, there is no longer any mention of delaying the target. “We commit to the climate targets 2020, 2030 and 2050," it reads. "We want to close the action-gap to reach the 2020 climate target as fast as possible”.
The earlier text had stated that Germany could only reach the 2020 target a few years later. It may have been intended as an acknowledgement of reality - Germany is not on course to meet the target because of stronger-than-expected economic growth and a phase-out of nuclear power. But it suggested that the target itself would be delayed in order to make it feasible.
That tentative agreement was leaked, and received negative media attention both within Germany and internationally. Now it appears this negative attention has prompted negotiators to remove any suggestion of delaying the target.
But the fact remains that whether Germany keeps its 2020 target in place or not, it is still unlikely to meet it. The new agreement text therefor downplays the 2020 target and puts strong emphasis on 2030, saying this target must be met “by all means”. In other words, it's better just not to talk about the 2020 target.
The document will form the basis of formal coalition talks which are expected to begin shortly, and it is possible that the language delaying the 2020 targets will be reinserted during the course of upcoming high-level talks. However German Chancellor Angela Merkel is keen to stop this from happening. During the campaign, she promised that the government will find a way to meet the 2020 target.
Given that she has personally identified herself so closely with the target, if it is scrapped by negotiators it would be a symbol blow for the chancellor that could signal political weakness. She will be keen to avoid this, even if she knows that no matter what the target probably won’t be met. Even if this is the case, it cannot be acknowledged now at this delicate time for her political fortunes.
Climate less contentious
Overall, it appears that climate and energy issues will prove less contentious in these talks than they did in the failed round of negotiations late last year between Merkel, the Greens and the pro-business FDP. The Greens and FDP clashed over coal phase-outs and emissions reduction trajectories. The failure to agree was a major part of the reason why those talks collapsed in November.
By contrast, the energy and climate parts of this coalition agreement were agreed relatively early in the week. This is largely due to the fact that this ‘grand coalition’ between the country’s main center-right and center-left parties would be a continuation of the one that has been in place for the past several years. So the parties already know what they agree on.
There are some new elements in this agreement however. They are going ahead with their plan to phase out coal power, setting aside 1.5 billion euros to help coal-heavy regions transition to other forms of economic activity by 2021. They have also committed to increasing Germany’s share of renewable power to 65 percent by 2030, up from a 50 percent target in their previous coalition.
