"Then Germany would be bankrupt": Trump calls for the removal of wind turbines in the North Sea

Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger "Then Germany would be bankrupt": Trump calls for the removal of wind turbines in the North Sea David Schmitz • 17 hours • 2 minutes reading time The future US President Donald Trump is not a fan of generating energy from wind power. The future US President Donald Trump is calling for the removal of wind turbines in the North Sea. The 78-year-old published a report from last November on his online platform Truth Social about the announced withdrawal of the US oil company Apache from the region and criticized Great Britain for what he considered to be a "very big mistake" in energy policy. "Open up the North Sea. Get rid of the wind turbines!" wrote Trump, who last autumn during the US election campaign also mocked Germany for its energy policy with wind turbines. "They put up wind turbines everywhere and the wind didn't blow as hard. And if they had continued this process, Germany would be bankrupt now," Trump said. Contrary to what the Republican suggested, Germany has recently been building more wind turbines year after year. Donald Trump demands of London: "Get rid of the wind turbines!" In Great Britain, Trump received support for his demand on Friday from Nigel Farage, head of the right-wing populist party Reform UK. "I agree 100 percent," Farage responded to Trump's demand, according to a report in the "Independent". Most recently, Trump advisor and tech billionaire Elon Musk expressed his support for Farage's party. "Only reform can save the United Kingdom," Musk announced on Platform X. The tech billionaire recently made similar comments about the equally right-wing populist AfD in Germany. Donald Trump receives support from Nigel Farage Researchers and climate activists, meanwhile, reacted with harsh criticism to Trump's initiative. "The US president-elect is not speaking on behalf of the people of Great Britain, but on behalf of his own 'Drill Baby Drill' agenda and the bosses of the major oil companies who have pumped millions into his campaign," the British "Guardian" quoted Greenpeace UK's chief scientist Doug Parr as saying. In the report now shared by Trump, Apache justifies its withdrawal from the North Sea by 2029 by saying that rising taxes would make oil production uneconomical. The British government elected in July under Prime Minister Keir Starmer is placing much greater emphasis on more environmentally friendly energy. New licenses for oil and gas companies to drill in the North Sea are no longer to be awarded. Great Britain is increasingly relying on renewable energy Trump, on the other hand, had already lowered standards for climate and environmental protection during his first term in office (2017-2021). On his initiative, the USA withdrew from the Paris Climate Agreement in 2020. His successor Joe Biden reversed this. The North Sea is one of the oldest offshore oil and gas deposits in the world. However, production there has been steadily declining since the turn of the millennium. According to the Guardian, only 34 million tons of oil were produced there in 2023, the lowest amount since production began in the North Sea in the 1970s, the British newspaper reported. According to the report, many oil companies have now withdrawn because "accessible fossil fuels" in the North Sea are now becoming scarce. At the same time, the sea has developed into one of the world's largest offshore wind regions. (das/dpa)