Stagnating economy: energy consumption in Germany will fall again in 2024

Although some sectors of industry use more energy again, primary energy consumption continued to fall in Germany. CO₂ emissions are falling particularly sharply.

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Oct 30, 2024 at 11:45 am CET

2 min. read

By

Martin Holland

Germany's energy consumption is expected to fall again this year to another record low and end up around 30 percent below the previous peak. This has been determined by the Working Group on Energy Balances (AGEB), which has been compiling energy data since reunification. According to the study, the stagnating economy has played a major role in the decline. Even though energy-intensive industries in particular have recently had a greater demand again, the decline in the manufacturing and processing industries is even greater. This has also offset the effects of increased consumption due to the growing population, for example.

CO₂ emissions fall particularly sharply

According to AGEB, domestic primary energy consumption in the first nine months of the year amounted to 7538 petajoules, 2.6% less than in the previous year. For the year as a whole, it expects a total value of 10,453 petajoules, compared to 14,905 petajoules in 1990. Because natural gas and renewable energies recently accounted for a higher proportion of German energy consumption and coal and mineral oil for a lower proportion, "there was a disproportionate reduction in carbon intensity". Overall, the working group expects energy-related CO₂ emissions to fall by 3.3% compared to the previous year.

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Despite this positive development in terms of CO₂ emissions, fossil fuels continue to dominate the structure of primary energy consumption. Accordingly, mineral oil accounted for 37.2% in the first nine months, natural gas for 24.9% and hard coal and lignite together for 14.7%. Renewables only accounted for 20.2 percent (compared to 19.1 percent in the same period last year). Finally, AGEB writes that in the first three quarters, 19.6 billion kWh (70.6 petajoules) more electricity was purchased from abroad than was exported from Germany. However, this is merely a sign of a functioning European domestic market and does not indicate any dependency or shortage.