After the coalition between the Union and the SPD settled on the key points for the Building Modernisation Act and the amendment of the Heat Planning Act, the German Association of Cities and Municipalities welcomed the proposals but demanded clearer conditions.
Chief executive André Berghegger told the “Rheinische Post” that the heat transition is a societal task and that cities and municipalities lie at its centre. “Communities need reliable, understandable and long‑term legal frameworks, as well as solid financial and personnel support, to implement local heat planning and the heat transition successfully” he said. “Without these foundations good intentions remain ineffective”.
Berghegger urged swift legislative action to provide planning certainty. He suggested that a quota for climate‑friendly fuels in oil and gas heating could offer flexibility and technological openness, but stressed that this must not undermine the economic viability of existing municipal and municipal utility plans, particularly those concerning the expansion of heat networks. He called for the exclusion of macro‑economic inefficiencies that could arise from parallel development of heat infrastructures and for simplified heat‑plan preparation in smaller municipalities.
The association highlighted that a reliable and consistent funding framework is key to the heat transition’s success. “Only through sufficiently financed, long‑term and reliably structured programmes, such as the Federal Funding for Efficient Buildings (BEG) and the Federal Funding for Efficient Heat Networks (BEW), can economic hardships be avoided, investment readiness be strengthened and social acceptance gained” Berghegger continued. “In district heating alone the investment need is estimated at €43.5 billion by 2030”.
Meanwhile, Left Party leader Ines Schwerdtner sharply criticised the new Building Energy Law. “What the federal government offers is a gift to the gas lobby” she told the “Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland”. Reducing the renewable energy quota and further allowing old gas and oil furnaces will drag millions straight into the fossil‑fuel cost trap.
She dismissed Jens Spahn’s remarks that the heating closet should return to private hands as the cheapest form of cultural conflict, adding that those who install gas heaters will soon struggle with high gas prices. Schwerdtner warned that everyone wants to stop further planetary damage, but many cannot afford the retrofit. “The state must step in” she said. “Climate protection must be affordable and fair for all. If people cannot afford the shift, the state should pay for heat pumps-potentially 100 percent of the cost”.