Climate action law must secure social acceptance and German competitiveness – industry

Germany’s planned climate action law must not only prescribe CO₂ emissions reduction, but secure social acceptance, technical feasibility and Germany’s competitiveness, Holger Lösch, deputy director general of the Federation of German Industries (BDI), says in an article by business daily Handelsblatt. “Successful climate action must be ecologically, economically and socially balanced. Otherwise there is a great danger that it will fail in the face of political and economic reality,” Lösch told the paper. In the long background article, Handelsblatt says the climate action law will be one of the German government’s biggest challenges over the coming months.
In its 2018 coalition agreement, the government said it would introduce a federal climate action law aimed at making 2030 sectoral emissions targets in line with the Paris Agreement binding, by the end of 2019. Accompanying this law, the environment ministry aims to put measures in place to reach the targets. Originally, other ministries were supposed to deliver measure proposals for their respective sectors by the end of 2018. However, delays to the work of the coal exit and the mobility commissions threatens the government's climate policy timetable.