The G7 agrees to accelerate coal phase-out, but Germany has criticized its support for nuclear power

The G7 energy and environment ministers have agreed to accelerate efforts to move away from coal and other fossil fuels, although they have not set a new concrete deadline to do so, as several member states of the group have striven to do, and Germany has criticized leaders who continue to support nuclear power as Berlin celebrates the closure of all of its country’s plants.

“We underline our commitment, in the context of global efforts, to the phasing out fossil fuels to achieve zero-emission energy systems by 2050,” said the joint statement adopted by the ministers of the Group of Seven at the end of their meeting in Sapporo (North Japan).

The document is not accompanied by this pledge with a specific deadline before 2050, as several G7 members had claimed, due to disagreements with other countries, such as the host country, whose energy supply is heavily dependent on coal and gas and oil imports.

The ministers advocate diversification of sources of energy supply and rapidly developing “clean, safe, sustainable and affordable energy” within the agreed global framework of action for 2050 and aiming at limiting the planetary temperature increase to 1.5°C.

The statement nevertheless recognizes “the importance of national energy security, its affordability and resilience”, as well as “the need to address energy poverty and provide support to affected workers, regions and communities”.

This is interpreted as an allusion to the industrializing countriesand particularly for emerging economies in Asia that are heavily dependent on coal, such as Japan.

Germany criticizes support for nuclear energy

For its part, the German government, which shut down its last nuclear power plants yesterday, criticized at the meeting the group’s commitment to “each at its own pace” to achieve a society free of fossil fuels, including reliance on nuclear energy. .

German Environment Minister Steffi Lemke said that “it is no secret that different G7 countries have different views on nuclear energy”.

The minister’s statements come after the day before her country disconnected its last three power stations, Isar 2 and Neckar 2, in the south, as well as Emsland, in the center, marking a final farewell to this kind of energy in the middle of an energy crisis exacerbated by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The document signed today by the countries of the group says that “countries that choose to use nuclear power recognize its potential to provide affordable low-carbon energy that can reduce dependence on fossil fuels, to address the climate crisis and to ensure the security of world energy”.