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Kalübber's mayor is outraged: the heating concept is a total loss!
The municipality of Kalübbe in the Plön district is planning a heating concept, which Mayor Rüter has assessed critically. The focus is on the progress of heat planning.
Kalübber's mayor is outraged: the heating concept is a total loss!
In the small community of Kalübbe, with its 560 inhabitants, there is a lot of activity. Mayor Björn Rüter (CDU) is fed up with the current heating concept, which cost the impressive amount of over 70,000 euros. At a meeting of the local council, a neighborhood and heating concept was decided upon, but according to Rüter, it only contains inadequate suggestions. Instead of innovative approaches, the concept is largely limited to insulating houses and installing heat pumps. This criticism is also justified, because the implementation not only seems to ignore reality, but could also raise false expectations. At a residents' meeting, Rüter apologized for the use of outdated census data in the potential analysis, which led to buildings from the 1950s being rated with excessive energy efficiency values, which unnecessarily increased heat requirements.
But what is behind these developments? Since the Heat Planning Act came into force on January 1, 2024, municipalities have been obliged to develop an appropriate heat concept. This law creates clear guidelines for the decarbonization of heating networks and promotes climate-friendly and cost-efficient heat supply. The federal government is supporting the implementation with 500 million euros until 2028. Cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants must submit their plans by June 30, 2026, smaller municipalities have until 2028 to do so. This is intended to counteract the persistently high CO2 emissions caused by heat supply in Germany - this accounts for over 50% of national energy consumption, with fossil fuels covering around 80% of heat demand, as bmwsb.bund.de explained.
Challenges of municipal heat planning
But the criticism of the concept in Kalübbe reflects a larger problem that affects many municipalities. Jörg Bülow, from the Schleswig-Holstein Association of Municipalities, warns that the bureaucracy and effort involved in heat planning are often overwhelming and often make the work of municipalities more difficult. He fears that citizens will ultimately have to bear the brunt of the requirements of the Building Energy Act and criticizes the fact that instead of attractive incentives, the focus is primarily on bureaucratic measures, as bbsr.bund.de shows.
The debate about heat supply could not only affect small and medium-sized towns like Kalübbe, but also extends throughout Germany. So far, 42% of municipalities have started drawing up their heat plans, whereas just 2% have already completed them. There is a clear difference in the regional differences in implementation. Particularly in North Rhine-Westphalia, which is home to 396 municipalities, numerous plans must be completed by mid-2026. On the other hand, federal states such as Baden-Württemberg have long had numerous municipalities that have successfully implemented their concepts.
The framework conditions have been clearly set with the aim of making heat supply climate-neutral by 2045 and reducing CO2 emissions by 65% by 2030. But whether the municipalities can meet the requirements with their current concepts remains questionable. In Kalübbe, the mayor's patience has run out, and the demands for practical solutions have put the reins of action in the hands of the citizens.