DW: The Germans store firewood for the winter

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“I don’t want to be cold in the winter, I’ve been there before,” customers tell fireplace manufacturer Ginder Meurer, who is facing twice as much demand as last year.

That a lumber mill would once “embody” the fears of the Germans about the coming winter was unthinkable a few months ago. THE Christian Resgen, owner of a sawmill in the town of St. Augustine near Bonn, puts his cell phone on silent to quietly answer the DW reporter. He talks about customers who are filling warehouses with wood for fear that the Russians will turn off the tap for good and Germany will run out of natural gas in the winter.

One customer, says Christian Resgen, removed natural gas heating in his home and installed stoves with pellets, wood pellets from sawdust or biomass. The sawmill owner talks about a supplier of his who produces wood pellets and has sold out of everything for weeks. For some time now, even the sawdust from the sawmill in St. Augustine has been collected immediately after the timber is cut and transported directly to pellet plants. These days the thermometer in Germany may be hitting red and we have temperatures above 30 degrees, says Christian Resgen, but Germans are stocking up for the coming winter.

50% of households are heated with gas and 25% with oil

Almost half of the homes in Germany are heated with natural gas. Although the Nord Stream 1 pipeline is partially back in operation, the price of natural gas has soared and consumers are worried about energy security.

“I don’t want to get cold in the winter, I’ve been there before,” customers tell the fireplace manufacturer Ginder Moirer, which is facing twice as much demand as last year. It has even closed its branches due to high demand and is informing interested customers on the phone that new fireplaces will begin to be delivered after winter at the earliest. Some fireplace manufacturers refer their customers after the summer of 2023.

The Federal Firewood Association estimates that about 80% of the wood in domestic fireplaces and wood stoves comes from Germany. The price of natural gas may triple by the beginning of 2023, Federal Network Agency President Klaus Müller told German news network RND. Heating with wood is much cheaper. But the price per kilowatt-hour of power from firewood has also been on an upward trajectory since last fall because demand has soared recently.

Currently government subsidies are boosting consumer demand for a switch to wood heating. In order to promote climate protection, Berlin financially supports the energy-efficient renovation of buildings. For example, anyone who chooses to abandon conventional oil heating and switch to a biomass heating system, including pellets, has the German government on their side, covering up to 45% of the total cost. Since the beginning of 2022 almost 60,000 applications for biomass heating systems have been submitted to the relevant Federal Office of Economic Affairs and Export Control.

Microparticles favor respiratory diseases

However, burning wood also has significant disadvantages. Almost 20% of fine particle pollution in Germany is caused by wood burning in households, despite the fact that the number of wood heating systems is quite small. In fact, according to expert Marcel Langner from the Federal Environment Agency, microparticles are inhaled and are therefore responsible for respiratory diseases, as well as cardiovascular diseases.

At the sawmill a few kilometers outside of Voni, Christian Resgen talks about new housing estates in the wider area, where he goes by truck to supply each house with pellets in special storage areas. Often the windows in the basements are small or the pellets are forced through bedrooms or sensitive floors until they reach the basements. However, in order to cope with the unprecedented demand, Christian Resgen is now selling the pellets with….a slip. Only three pallets are available to each customer.

DW / Matis Richtman / Editor: Stefanos Georgakopoulos

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