French and German MPs call for trilateral energy transition partnership with Poland
Table.Media
Members of parliament from France and Germany have called for intensifying efforts to create a more coherent energy policy together with Poland, Table.Media reported. The three major EU member states together form an informal alliance known as the “Weimar Triangle,” which aims to streamline key policy decisions between Paris, Berlin and Warsaw. The Franco-German parliamentary group now aims to establish an “energy transition platform” within the triangle group that would foster closer cooperation between gas and electricity grid operators to increase supply security and save costs on the path to climate neutrality, wrote Table.Media.
Among other things, the scheme should focus on hydrogen and geothermal energy and be open to include further participants, a document by the group of German and French MPs seen by Table.Media said. "Germany and France must be the ecologic engines of a European energy union and a climate neutral EU," Christian Democrat (CDU) MP Andreas Jung said. The opposition politician coordinates the group’s work, which brings together 100 members of the French and German parliaments. “If we work together, we can achieve a lot and integrate more partners – for example Poland through the Weimar Triangle,” Jung added.
The EU’s two largest economies and most populous member states, Germany and France account for a large part of the bloc’s energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. Poland, another major European state with a large population, is among the fastest-growing economies in Europe and still largely relies on fossil fuels to power its industry. With the change in government in Warsaw under prime minister Donald Tusk, Poland’s energy and climate positions have edged closer to those of Germany and France again, sparking hopes for a more effective cooperation within the Weimar Triangle. However, bilateral French-German energy policy cooperation often suffers from differing energy strategies and competition regarding system costs and industry investments. French president Emmanuel Macron plans to meet with German chancellor Olaf Scholz at the end of next week during an official three-day state visit in a bid to further improve the two countries’ long-standing partnership.
