Foundation says it can cover hard coal’s “eternity costs” after phase-out

After the closure of Germany’s last hard coal mine on 21 December, the legacy of mining in western Germany will entail so-called eternity costs that amount to at least 220 million euros per year, Klaus Deuse writes for Deutsche Welle. The money needed for soil stabilisation and water management in the regions were coal mining was a key economic activity for more than 100 years is going to be paid by the RAG Foundation, which already received funding in 2017 from the RAG mining company to implement the phase-out of Germany’s heavily subsidised hard coal mining sector. Bernd Tönjes, head of the RAG Foundation, said that even if annual costs rise, the foundation would have sufficient means to fully finance the hard coal industry’s phase-out, mainly thanks to its majority ownership of the prospering chemicals producer Evonik.