The housing industry has welcomed the improvements to the heating legislation announced by Economy Minister Robert Habeck (Greens).
“That is exactly what we demanded from the beginning: to look at the feasibility of the law and to surround it socially so that no one is overburdened,” said the President of the German Association of Housing and Real Estate Companies (GdW), Axel Gedaschko. , for the newspapers of the Funk media group. Considering the severe shortage of technicians, the proposal to extend the duration of the existing buildings should also be carefully evaluated.
“I want to make the law better”
After a bitter union dispute, Habeck promised to revise plans to switch heating to renewable energy at some point. “I want to make the law better,” he told Funke newspapers. He announced joint talks with his new Secretary of State Philipp Nimmermann in the coming week. Therefore, a meeting between Habeck and MPs from the traffic light groups SPD, Greens and FDP is scheduled for this Tuesday.
Habeck identified four areas for improvement. In this way, the plan scheduled to start on January 1, 2024 can be modified by only applying the law to the new buildings that are planned. In a video distributed by the Ministry, he made it clear that more time can be given to the old construction stock. With various planned technologies, even more can be achieved, for example with the use of wood pellets. Especially with the intention of the cities, the “massive heat treatment of the district” should begin. There are already many variations to the hardness rules. But you can “look closer and be kinder”.
The law states that from next year every new heating system must run on at least 65 percent green energy. Alternatively, you can also switch to airless heating from the heating network. Change should be socially constrained, and there should also be transition periods and rigid rules – the details of this, however, are controversial.