Fracking in Germany? Nein danke! by Mark Halper, February 12, 2013, Smart Planet
Frack off. Germany’s environment minister Peter Altmaeir doesn’t want fracking. Germany may be looking for new sources of energy following its decision to abandon nuclear power, but it seems determined to avoid “fracking,” the controversial method for extracting natural gas that is booming in the United States.
“The message is we want to limit fracking, we don’t want to facilitate it,” environment minister Peter Altmaier told Deutschlandfunk radio, as reported by Reuters in The Guardian. “And anyway I don’t see in the forseeable future that fracking will be employed anywhere within Germany.” Germany’s Parliament has proposed rules that would tighten restrictions on fracking….
Corporate giants including ExxonMobil and Germany’s BASF – the world’s largest chemicals company and owner of an oil and gas division called Wintershall – want to explore fracking possibiilties. Under Germany’s federal structure, individual states can decide whether to issue permits. Since deciding to walk away from nuclear power in the wake of Japan’s Fukushiuma nuclear meltdowns nearly two years ago, Germany – Europe’s largest economy – has had to find substitute sources of energy. Ironically, it has been importing nuclear power from France. It also has a strong renewables program, but that has not prevented it from increasing its use of fossil fuels like coal and thus adding to its CO2 emissions. … Germany currently supplies only 14 percent of its natural gas and imports 40 percent of what it consumes from Russia, according to the Reuters article.
Cracking the fracking story on SmartPlanet:
- True or false? Fracking equals cheap gas
- The murky future of U.S. shale gas
- PA study uncovers no hydrofracking pollution
- Hydrofracking drives new water treatment solutions
- Farmers hope to cash in on fracking phenomenon
- EPA: hydrofracking may have tainted Wyoming groundwater
- Ohio: frackers caused earthquakes
- Fracking triggered British earthquakes
More German power plays:
- Solar electricity record: Germany cranks half its power with PV
- Nuclear down, CO2 up in Japan, Germany
- MIddle East company to rescue German solar maker
- Insurance against sunsets: Munich Re steps in if your solar panel provider goes bust
Refer also to:
Bundesrat-Länder resolution of December 2012 was reaffirmed on 01-02-2013 (in German)