Grid expansion: industry calls for faster approval procedures

An alliance from the telecommunications and energy sectors is increasing the pressure on the German government to finally agree on a joint approach for the long-planned law to accelerate network expansion. The energy association BDEW, the broadband alliances Anga and Breko as well as VATM, in which competitors of Deutsche Telekom have joined forces, are jointly appealing to Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) to "declare this important project a top priority". The initiative is intended to simplify the expansion of fiber optics and mobile communications and accelerate the process. Minor construction work on the infrastructure could thus be carried out without a permit.

The Federal Ministry of Digital and Transport's (BMDV) draft bill for the acceleration law has been available since August. The project has also appeared on the timetables for the Federal Cabinet for months, but is regularly removed from the agenda for specific meetings shortly before they are due to take place. A coordinated government draft, which could then go through the Bundestag and Bundesrat, is still a long time coming. The main reason for this is that the BMDV and the Ministry of the Environment cannot agree on whether the expansion - particularly with the help of mobile phone masts – should be defined as being "in the overriding public interest". In this case, nature conservation and monument protection may have to take a back seat.

"This development makes us concerned about Germany as a digital location and the federal government's expansion plans," explain the associations. "Faster approval procedures and less bureaucracy are an important key to achieving nationwide fiber optic and mobile network expansion by 2030. The fact that high data rates can flow between Kiel and Constance is a basic prerequisite for both the competitiveness of many companies and the realization of major social projects such as the energy transition." In any case, it is already questionable whether gigabit will be available to everyone by the end of the decade.

Bitkom wants "right of way for network expansion"

The digital association Bitkom is also calling separately for "right of way for network expansion", as approvals for building applications for new masts or lines alone would currently take months or even years. Bitkom Managing Director Bernhard Rohleder demands: "The Federal Ministry for the Environment should take its foot off the brake and give network expansion the importance it deserves: Telecommunications networks, just like the expansion of renewable energies, are of 'paramount public interest' and should be officially classified as such." This is important for the approval authorities "to be able to clear the way for grid expansion in the event of conflicting objectives, particularly with nature conservation".

Rohleder also recalls the Federal Network Agency's plan to significantly increase the coverage requirements for the major network operators in the next frequency allocation: Telekom, Vodafone and Telefónica (o2) would then have to cover 99.5 percent of the entire area of Germany by 2030. At the same time, however, 32 percent of this would consist of forest and over four percent would be designated as nature conservation areas, Rohleder points out. In order for the companies to be able to fulfill the planned conditions at all, the government must "now clear the legal hurdles out of the way without delay".

Otherwise, the executive should come clean with consumers about the fact that not all mobile network loopholes can currently be closed for political reasons, according to Bitkom. There is no point in pointing the finger at the network operators. At least the conference of federal and state digital ministers agreed in April that digitalization must be accelerated.

(nie)