2023-12-01 09:22:58
When the traffic light coalition settled its dispute over the Building Energy Act (GEG) in mid-June, there was hardly any talk of the heat pumps that had previously been so heatedly discussed, but there was even more talk of another type of heating: “We believe that district heating is often an attractive answer to the question decarbonization can be,” said Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) at the time. To date, around three quarters of residential buildings in Germany are heated with gas or oil. Only 6 percent or 1.2 million houses use district heating from a thermal power plant. Calculated based on the number of apartments, the proportion is 15 percent. Habeck praises district heating as “a particularly cost-efficient, climate-neutral solution for heat supply”.
But it is not yet clear whether the expansion of district heating will be as self-sustaining as some people in Berlin give the impression. Since the beginning of the year, the Federal Association of Consumer Organizations (VZBV) has been collecting exemplary district heating prices in 31 locations in Germany. The first analysis, which is available to the FAZ in advance, shows considerable differences.
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