Coastal states are demanding more expensive electricity for the south - Bavaria is protesting

According to a report by WELT AM SONNTAG, three northern German federal states are calling for Germany to be divided into regional electricity price zones in view of the sharp rise in electricity prices. "Such a division would be nothing other than the logical consequence of the energy policy mistake by Horst Seehofer, Markus Söder and Co.", explained Schleswig-Holstein's Energy Transition Minister Tobias Goldschmidt (Greens) with a view to Bavaria's energy policy.

"For more than 15 years, the Bavarian state government played a citizens' initiative on energy policy and sabotaged the expansion of electricity grids and wind power," said Goldschmidt. It was "simply no longer possible to explain to the people in the north why they have to pay the bill for it."

The politician receives support from Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania's Economics and Energy Minister Reinhard Meyer (SPD). "The level of electricity grid fees burdens end consumers and disadvantages the north German business location," he criticizes. Regions such as Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania or Schleswig-Holstein, which shoulder a large share of the expansion of renewable energies, cannot be expected to have to cope with the highest electricity prices. "That's unfair."

Lower Saxony's Energy Minister Olaf Lies (SPD) agrees with the demand. "Whether it's the expansion of renewables, the major power lines or the construction of green-gas-ready import terminals: the north has been bearing the brunt of the energy transition for many years, so it's obvious to me that this burden will also benefit the regions that are particularly affected," said Lies.

"If I live or produce where the energy is also produced or landed, this energy must also be cheaper there."

The EU is also examining the bidding zones in order to remove obstacles on the common electricity market. Regions that do not eliminate network bottlenecks by 2025 should become their own zones. Ex-Federal Minister of Economics Peter Altmaier (CDU) had therefore presented an "Action Plan" to expand the networks. However, its timely implementation is considered unlikely, if only because the completion of the 700-kilometer SuedLink route from northern to southern Germany has been delayed by years.

If Germany does not succeed in complying with the requirements in good time, a division of the market is likely to be a consequence of the EU process. The agency of the European regulatory authorities, ACER, put forward proposals for discussion on August 8, according to which Germany could even be divided into up to five zones. The example of Sweden shows what that can mean: There, in the two southern bidding zones, the prices on the spot market are almost four times higher than in the north.

"The clock is ticking. The EU Commission and the Member States have agreed on a clear timetable for reviewing the bidding zones,” said Energy Minister Goldschmidt. Germany will very likely not keep its commitments made for 2025. Goldschmidt said he wondered whether stopping the division of Germany into different price zones should be a goal at all. Because “from an industrial policy point of view, true costs are needed”.

High-consumption companies would have to settle where there is a lot of green electricity, and there are still too few incentives for this, according to the minister: "This is not only wrong in terms of climate policy, it also exacerbates grid bottlenecks and thus drives up the costs for consumers up.” The maintenance of uniform price zones, explained the minister, was “not an end in itself”.

Bavaria's Economics Minister Hubert Aiwanger reacted immediately to the initiative from the North. The Free Voter politician said on Saturday that there was no need for a “small-scale debate about grid fees and electricity price zones”, but rather a “price cap for electricity and gas”.