Preview 2026: Clear commitment to upholding Germany's renewables boom still lacking – industry
***This interview is part of a series with experts to preview energy and climate policy developments in Germany and Europe in 2026.***
Clean Energy Wire: The so-called ‘reality check’ monitoring report on the energy transition that was tabled by Germany’s economy ministry in autumn 2025 has led to concerns in the renewable energy industry regarding the future expansion course for wind, solar, and other renewables. At the beginning of 2026, do these concerns still persist?
Ursula Heinen-Esser: The monitoring report has underlined the key role that renewables play in a secure and affordable electricity supply, and it confirmed the necessity of not slowing down the expansion. The current trend is clear: Nearly two thirds of electricity production was covered by renewable power sources in 2025. Renewables have become such a central element of our electricity supply that a drop in investments would harm more than just one industry.
If we want to make our energy supply affordable, sustainable, and resilient now and in the future, renewables really are the only right choice. They offer domestic value creation, often directly at the local level and help free us from dependencies created by energy politics. In addition, renewables leave other energy sources behind in terms of power generation costs. They are not only central to climate action but also help stabilise Germany economically and increase its resilience to external shocks.
How would you generally rate the performance of the coalition government of chancellor Friedrich Merz in energy and climate policy so far? Where do you see promising approaches – and where do you identify notable shortcomings?
The recently adopted Economic Promotion Act for Germany, which is supposed to steer investments into renewable energy, is a good signal in my opinion, much like the commitments to faster planning and licensing set out in the Infrastructure of the Future Act. Apart from that, I welcome the fact that policymakers have begun to understand that grids, storage systems, and energy generation must be thought of as one integrated system.
At the same time, a clear signal from the government that the current expansion path for renewables will be resolutely continued is still lacking. One example for this is the mobility sector, where we would wish to see a clearer commitment to decarbonisation. A transformation as profound as the one that the German auto industry is faced with needs a reliable political framework. In Germany, the focus is largely set on protecting the status quo. This consumes resources needed for the necessary investment in future-oriented structures, which in turn makes it hard to safeguard value creation, jobs, and technological leadership in the area of renewable propulsion technologies in the long term.
Which topics and developments would you say are going to become relevant in 2026? And what conclusions do you think the government should draw from them?
The first months of the new year will clearly be focussed on the upcoming reform of the Renewable Energy Act (EEG) and the Building Modernisation Act (GMG). We urgently need clarity on the future course of the heating sector’s transition. For the coming year it will be important for the government to act both quickly and in a way that is viable in the long term. We need speed and substance – in grid expansion, in reducing bureaucracy, in the smart meter roll-out, and in digitalisation. Our call for action is therefore clear: We need system-friendly investments instead of short-term cost reduction measures.
