German government misses deadline to gauge CO2-savings by stand-by coal plants

The German government has failed to report the carbon emissions savings achieved by putting several coal plants into a security stand-by mode reserved for supply bottlenecks, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports. An assessment scheduled for the middle of the year was intended to prove whether the security reserve achieved the emissions reduction goal of 11 to 12.5 million tonnes CO₂ by 2020. “This process has not been finished yet due to its complexity,” the economy ministry said. If the goal is unlikely to be met, the government has to come up with alternative measures by December, the article says. The security reserve, which so far has not been used, is seen as a possible model for phasing-out the remainder of Germany’s coal plants, a procedure currently debated in Germany’s coal exit commission. 

Find plenty of background on the coal commission in the article Commission watch – Managing Germany’s coal phase-out.