A turn to geopolitics: Shifts in the German energy transition discourse in light of Russia's war against Ukraine

Abstract

Germany's Energiewende is often considered a role model for the transition to renewable energy. And notwithstanding some domestic disputes about costs and practical implementation, it enjoys broad multiparty and multi-sector commitment. However, Russia's 2022 war against Ukraine marks a turning point in Germany's energy politics. We examine the war's repercussions on the Energiewende discourse drawing on newspaper articles, tweets, talk shows, and parliamentary speeches published shortly after the beginning of the war. We show that economic, environmental, and technological considerations become complicated by a new emphasis on security, freedom, and sovereignty. We identify four discursive shifts caused by this turn to geopolitics: 1) There is renewed controversy about whether gas imports slowed down the Energiewende or were necessary to support it. This weakens the discursive consensus on the desirability of the Energiewende. 2) In light of the new moral imperative for reducing dependence on Russian gas, the ecological modernization paradigm is challenged. 3) Lignite, nuclear power, and LNG are in contradiction to the goals of the Energiewende, but gain popularity as bridging technologies because they promise to increase supply security. 4) At the same time, additional funding for, and an accelerated implementation of renewable energy is justified by the new emphasis on security, freedom, and sovereignty. While it is too early to tell whether those discursive shifts will overall strengthen or weaken Germany's energy transition in the long run, they are important to understand political conflicts about the future of the project and its international repercussions.