This weekend, Switzerland’s commitment towards reducing carbon emissions was tested in a national vote which challenged the strength and sustainability of green politics.
The Climate Law passed by a referendum with 58% of the vote on Sunday has highlighted the unique Swiss obstacles Bern faces in its efforts to implement new measures that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions before 2050.
Switzerland is one of the most environmentally friendly countries in Europe. The public also has a high level of concern about climate change. In the face of an environmental crisis, the strengths of Switzerland’s political system – its highly devolved approach, consensus-based policy and opposition to legislative changes without months or years of deliberation – have made it vulnerable to populist , nimbyism, and filibustering.
In spite of the fact that green parties were gaining in popularity, around 42 percent of Swiss voters voted in opposition to the law.
The well-funded “No!” campaign has been depicting mountain views ruined by wind turbines for weeks. Critics warned that if the bill is passed, Switzerland could suffer the fate of Germany, where a plan to substitute gas boilers with renewable energy systems has brought the ruling party to its knees.
In 2019, Switzerland’s two green parties won just over a 5th of the vote in a reshuffled electoral system that pundits claimed reflected the urgency the Swiss public felt about global warming. The greens, however, have not been able to bring about any notable reforms.
The Climate Law. . . After two years of uncertainty, there is a new beginning in the climate politics of Switzerland,” said Lukas GOLDER, co-director at gfs.bern.
The new law is limited, so it remains to be determined how much the country will change. The law commits Switzerland towards carbon neutrality by the year 2050. It also creates a pool of subsidies worth SFr2bn to assist households in their transition from fossil fuels. Businesses can invest SFr1.2bn to develop more sustainable energy technologies.
Golder said that even if the vote was a “yes”, climate activists in Switzerland would still have to fight a hard battle. Both sides of the debate point out that there is no mention in the law about the source of the green electricity the consumers are to be using.
Christoph Brand, CEO of Axpo, the largest electricity producer in Switzerland, warned that Switzerland was resting on its laurels.
He said that, “right now, we are stars in terms of carbon intensity” when referring to the electricity produced by nuclear and hydro plants. By 2050, however, the country will have increased its electricity consumption from 62 to 90 terawatt hours. There is no additional hydro potential in Switzerland. . . Our solar and wind power is embarrassingly low.
He added, “There’s a tendency in Switzerland to move slowly — to say everything went well for the past 30 years and let’s extrapolate this for the next 30, just like we did for the previous 30.” “But it doesn’t in this case.”
Swiss energy utilities attribute the lack of progress to the planning laws of the country, a result of the devolved political system. In most countries, the central government has the power to override local concerns. But in Switzerland, it’s actually reversed. A single person or group of determined individuals can block or derail almost any project. Five wind turbines were built on the uninhabited Gotthard Pass after eight years of waiting.
Bern has implemented a number of workarounds to solve some of these problems. For example, Bern has limited the number of objections that an individual or organization can make. As a result, some projects were approved recently. The construction of the Ovra Solara Magriel Solar Farm, a 80,000 sq m solar farm on a mountainside near Andermatt which will generate 10MW power, will begin next year.
For the country to meet its 2050 goals, 80 sq km must be covered with solar panels.
In the meantime, the political climate has become polarised. The SVP, Switzerland’s largest party, which led the campaign to repeal the Climate Law, has made the environment debate one of their central issues. They have attacked policies as being “un-Swiss”, “anti-freedom”, and pointed to the wider European energy crisis to show that decarbonisation is impractical and harmful to ordinary people.
This issue falls along the faultline that the SVP is most fond of: the divide between the rural and urban areas. The party has gained support from rural communities where farmers depend on fossil fuels, and are opposed to external interference in local decisions.
In the midst of domestic tensions, the larger Swiss energy companies are focusing on building renewable power plants in Europe. Many in the industry think that the country will become a net exporter of European electricty.
Even this option can be problematic. The Swiss electricity trading agreement with the EU will expire next year due to the ongoing diplomatic dispute between the two parties over trade relations. Bern is unable to make concessions to Brussels due to opposition from both rightwing populists and socialists.
“This . . . Tobias Schmidt is the head of the Energy and Technology Policy Group at ETH (the technical university in Zurich).
“We could be facing a situation in which the Swiss are slowly disconnected from the European electric system. This is absurd because we are literally the center of it. For example, as the second largest exporter and importer of electricity to the continent, after Austria.”
Few see signs that a consensus will be reached quickly. “The [climate] discussion in Switzerland isn’t at all realistic. Schmidt said, “We want everything at the moment.” “We cannot both want to be more independent of the EU, and refuse to build renewable energy.”
I hope people don’t become so blinded by rolling blackouts that they fail to see the truth.