Once-reliable waterways have turned into liabilities
The European energy system is being stress-tested as the bloc’s most important rivers run dry, crippling output at nuclear and hydropower plants and threatening to do the same to the Rhine-dependent fleet of coal power plants powering Germany.
Two waterways shape the EU’s electricity system like no others: the Danube – once the main artery of the Habsburg Empire – and the Rhine, which supports the bloc’s industrial heartland.
As of Monday, the Rhine was at a low level at 43% of measuring points along its length, while the Danube was “extremely low” in 59% of locations, and low elsewhere, according to the German water-level tracker.
“This is a very early point in the year for the kind of problem we’re experiencing now,” said Steffen Bilger, Germany’s newly appointed transport minister, on Monday as he called for an emergency conference in Bonn on Thursday, in comments to Reuters.
