News"A demolition without necessity"

"A demolition without necessity"

Created: 10/06/2022, 3:48 p.m

Die Hoffnung klebt bis zuletzt: das Ortsschild, aufgenommen am Tag nach der Entscheidung. A. Stoffel/dpa
Hope sticks to the end: the town sign, taken the day after the decision. A. Stoffel/dpa © A. Stoffel/dpa

Despite the exit from coal: The village of Lützerath has to give way to opencast mining. A decision that affects even those people who live in the neighboring villages that are now believed to have been saved.

Eckardt Heukamp, the last farmer from Lützerath, believed in a miracle until the end. Even when he handed over the key to his farm to the lignite company RWE last Sunday, he didn’t want to give up hope that the village would be saved from the Garzweiler opencast mine. It has been clear since October 4th that this miracle will not happen.

In a press conference on the coal phase-out in 2030, Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens), North Rhine-Westphalian Economics Minister Mona Neubaur (Greens) and RWE CEO Markus Krebber announced that the “no longer inhabited” place should be cleared and demolished promptly.

Those who have opposed opencast mining there for over two years and at the same time tried out alternative life plans are fighting against this trivialization that Lützerath is a “ghost village” or a “symbol”. “I’m from the village myself,” says Jonas, who lives as a tenant in Lützerath. “I’ve never been able to get to know such a permanently lively village structure before. I would say Lützerath is one of the liveliest villages in Germany. It is a place for networking, a think tank, the thematic and emotional focal point of the climate justice movement – but if it isn’t one thing, then it’s empty.”

So far, says Jonas, who works as a clerk, he hasn’t received a valid notice of termination of his lease, so he doesn’t expect an immediate eviction. “Actually, I think it would be appropriate if the state politicians sought to talk to us tenants – also in the absence of local politics, which is not to be seen here at all.”

“The state for the corporation”

Ronni, spokeswoman for the local activists, considers such talks pointless: “The state presented itself as a mediator for the group; other voices were not heard. The only security of supply that the talks were ultimately about is that RWE can continue to make profits.” A coal stop in 2030 is “a disaster for everyone who is already affected by the climate catastrophe”. It is now a matter, says Ronni, of solving the social and ecological problems yourself, “so that the abstract market no longer decides who is in the heat”.

Running away from the eviction is out of the question for Ronni – although he is aware that it will shock younger people in particular “to experience how their belief in what they expect from the state is destroyed”. He is sure: “The people here will fight as hard as they can and take care of each other. If we wanted to give up, we wouldn’t have come in the first place.”

The question of how they should deal with politics, how to react to Mona Neubaur’s offers of talks without allowing themselves to be co-opted, is now also on the minds of residents of the rescued villages north of the mine. David Dresen from Kuckum sees Tuesday’s announcements as a “Pyrrhic victory”. “Yes we are staying and yes this is a great success. But the fact that Lützerath is already being demolished without need is not worthy of a green party.” The reports cited by Neubaur also did not come to a clear conclusion: “No one says we need Lützerath this year. From our point of view, the decision makes sense from a socio-political point of view, because it finally brings security for the other villages. But it is useless in terms of climate policy.”

Kathrin Henneberger comes from the opencast mining region and was elected to the Bundestag for the first time in 2021. She helped shape the law on the availability of replacement power plants, during which the majority of the Bundestag voted in favor of retaining Lützerath. On Tuesday she tweeted, sober but combative: “I have now had to experience that even if Parliament agrees to take action against the climate crisis (#Lützerathbleibt), coal companies like RWE are not ready. All that’s left is to blow the dust off my harness and get on with it.”

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