THE GND IS TOO CAUTIOUS:

When Robert Habeck's election campaign came to Freiburg on September 10, 2021, he was very much on home ground. The Green Party's motto is "Ready - because you are." So where better than this Green stronghold to take the lead on sustainability and help Germany achieve climate neutrality as quickly as possible?

In 2008, the Black Forest city of Freiburg (population: 230,000) rather grandiosely adopted the title of "Green City." It likes to describe itself as the environmental capital of Germany. With 1,800 hours of sunshine a year, this southwestern city is a big promoter of solar energy, in line with Habeck's plans.

It already boasts a great many showcase projects: Freiburg's new city hall was one of the first in the world to be conceived as a zero-energy building, with 800 solar panels on the facade. The new soccer stadium has a world-beating solar installation on the stadium roof. The archdiocese of Freiburg aims to be the first in Germany to reduce the church's CO2 emissions to zero.

As the new climate protection minister, Robert Habeck wants to make Germany climate-neutral by 2045. And, as so often, Freiburg is ahead of the game: It hopes to achieve this seven years earlier, in 2038.

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