In a study published for the think tank EPICO KlimaInnovation, Consultancy Aurora Energy Research, has stressed that Germany must accelerate its energy transition by prioritising “no-regret” actions — measures that remain necessary regardless of how future electricity demand develops.

The report comes at a time when Germany’s new government has launched a monitoring process to assess the country’s energy transition, a process that has faced criticism for allegedly serving as a pretext to delay the roll-out of renewables.

Aurora Energy Research argues that uncertainty about future power demand should not be used as a reason to stall. Instead, it identifies three priority actions:

• Continue the expansion of renewable energy. Germany has already cut the power sector’s emissions by 50% since 2010, but further rapid deployment of solar and wind capacity will be essential to meet decarbonisation goals.
  
  
• Invest in flexibility. Scaling up storage, demand-side response and other flexible solutions will be vital to balance an increasingly intermittent supply and to lower costs for both consumers and taxpayers.
  
  
• Ensure security of supply through dispatchable capacity and flexibility. While the government’s plan foresees up to 20 GW of new gas capacity, the study cautions against oversizing. A balanced mix of dispatchable generation and flexible resources would be sufficient to safeguard reliability without locking in unnecessary costs or emissions.

Souce: Aurora Energy Research

The study highlights that energy policy must be designed to deliver a system capable of adapting to the electrification of sectors such as transport and industry, while avoiding structural inefficiencies and stranded assets.

“Uncertainty around demand growth is not a reason to delay action — it is a reason to double down on resilient, no-regret solutions,” the report concludes.

Aurora Energy Research and EPICO KlimaInnovation are calling on the German government to provide early clarity on key reforms, particularly the Renewable Energy Act (EEG) overhaul and the planned capacity mechanism, to give investors the policy certainty needed to accelerate the energy transition.