On the occasion of today's opening of the G20 Summit in London, in which the spotlight is on the economic and financial crisis, Federal Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel said:
"The economic crisis and the climate crisis must be solved together. All the G20 countries should therefore invest an average of at least 25 percent of their economic stimulus packages in environmental technologies. For investments in renewable energies and energy efficiency generate four to eight times more jobs than are created through expenditures on oil and gas. They improve the prospects for future growth. Against this background, I very much welcome that the host of the G20, the United Kingdom, has placed the issue of global green recovery on the agenda."
"In these times of crisis, we must think very carefully about how every single euro is spent. Those who invest in renewables and energy efficiency reduce tomorrow's energy costs - and thus secure economic growth and climate protection for the long term. In London, heads of state and government should therefore support the British proposal of a global green recovery. In the medium term, annual climate protection investments should amount to at least 1.5 percent of world GDP."
Background:
Economists recognise that investments in renewable energies and energy efficiency are not only the right answer to the climate crisis, they also make sense in terms of economic policy. For instance, in their joint study "Investments for a Climate-Friendly Germany", the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) and the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research (ISI) found that reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent by 2020 compared to 1990 levels will create a clear 500,000 new jobs and save an annual 20 billion euro in energy costs from 2020. According to the study, investments in building modernisation create eight times more jobs than the same amount spent on oil and gas imports. The study "Green Recovery" by the Center for American Progress (CAP) concludes that a 100 million dollar climate protection programme could create 2 million new jobs in the US, while the same money invested in the oil sector would bring just 500,000 new jobs.
Scientists like Lord Nicholas Stern (London School of Economics) and Prof. Edenhofer (Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research) call for a commitment by the G20 to spend at least 20 percent of their economic stimulus funding on environmental investments. A number of studies estimate that the efforts needed to achieve the EU climate protection target of limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius would cost between 1 and 2.5 percent of world GDP.
At the end of February 2009 HSBC Bank evaluated the known economic stimulus programmes of major countries in the report "A Climate for Recovery". In their study "Towards a Global Green Recovery" of March 2009, Edenhofer/Stern supplemented this with data on the G20 countries. Measures are defined as "green" if they steer future development towards green sectors of industry. The analysis shows that in 2009/2010 the G20 countries will earmark 2.6 trillion US dollars to economic stimulus programmes, with 396 billion US dollars of this - 15.2 percent - classed as "green". For Germany, 13.2 percent of both economic stimulus programmes are considered "green". This puts Germany in fourth place behind South Korea (80.5 percent), China (34.3 percent) and France (21.2 percent). It must be noted however, that the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) generates support of around 4.5 billion euro per year for electricity from renewable sources through the EEG surcharge. Consequently, in contrast to other countries, additional support was not necessary in Germany.