German states push back against federal plan to relax heating decarbonisation rules

Several German states are dissatisfied with federal plans to relax decarbonisation rules in the heating sector, as these clash with their more ambitious targets for achieving climate neutrality, newspaper Tagesspiegel reported.States like Baden-Württemberg, Lower Saxony and Hamburg have all committed to becoming climate neutral by 2040. State government officials argue that plans by the federal government to drop a mandatory renewable energy share, and to allow the installation of new oil and gas heating systems even beyond the national climate neutrality deadline of 2045, would undermine efforts at the state level. “It makes no sense to modernise electricity grids for a wide roll-out of heat pumps, to build new [district] heating networks, and to simultaneously keep a gas grid on life support that is growing ever more expensive,” said Thekla Walker, Green party energy minister in southern Baden-Württemberg. Prioritising renewable energy would be the most reasonable course of action also from an economic point of view, she said. Lower Saxony's Green party environment minister Christian Meyer said the proposal for Germany’s Building Modernisation Act, which contains the disputed heating regulation, would be “a massive step back” that pushes people into costly fossil heating systems and imposes an equally costly bioenergy quota. He said his state would press ahead with its 2040 climate neutrality target – “including for heating systems through using renewable energy.” The city state of Hamburg also said it intends to retain stricter heating rules contained in the original version of the law passed under the previous government. The draft law put forward by conservative Christian Democrat (CDU) energy minister Katherina Reiche and Social Democrat (SPD) buildings minister Verena Hubertz, contains an opening clause allowing states to deviate from federal regulations. However, Tagesspiegel reports that Green Party members are worried the clause could be removed before the law passes parliament. The heating row has been one of Germany’s most controversially debated climate policy measures of the past years. Originally drafted under former Green Party economy minister Robert Habeck, the CDU of chancellor Friedrich Merz in the 2025 election campaigned for “abolishing” the law designed to ensure that Germany meets emissions reduction targets in the laggard heating sector. Merz’s cabinet adopted the draft law last week, but members of the CDU are concerned that the current draft might not be sufficient to comply with a ruling on effective climate action by Germany’s highest court.

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