The German Advisory Council on the Environment (SRU) presented on Thursday (14 May) its report on the state of the country’s environmental policy. With Germany’s carbon budget now almost exhausted, researchers urge stronger climate action in all areas. EURACTIV Germany reports.

Every four years, the SRU presents a comprehensive report on the state of the country’s environment and has been doing so for almost 50 years.

Yesterday, it did it again: on almost 560 pages, the seven climate researchers of the SRU have done an all-round job which doesn’t paint a particularly good picture for Germany.

Germany is not on track with 20 of the 25 environmental goals of its own sustainability strategy, the report writes. And binding targets when it comes to water protection, air quality and climate protection are regularly missed.

“So far, the failures are too often simply accepted and targets are postponed into the future,” the researchers noted.

Germany’s environment minister Svenja Schulze (SPD) seemed open to criticism. In a video message, she said the growing warnings by environmental researchers since 30 years risked becoming an “oppressive ritual”.

“Very, very strong reductions” from 2030

Researchers have sounded the alarm with very concrete figures.

Germany is allowed to emit 6.7 billion tonnes of CO2 from 2020 if global warming of 1.75 degrees maximum is taken as the target, which researchers consider as the absolute maximum.

But if business as usual continues, this limit would already be reached in 2029. Consequently, if emissions were to be reduced linearly, Germany would have to be climate-neutral by 2038 at the latest, they argue.

“We will only achieve this if very, very strong reductions take place from 2030 at the latest,” said climate researcher Wolfgang Lucht.

The warnings by the German Advisory Council echo similar messages by climate activist Greta Thunberg. Speaking to EU environment ministers in March, the teen activist warned about the rapidly declining amount of carbon dioxide that world nations are still allowed to emit before the rise in global temperatures risks hitting dangerous levels.

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