Switzerland is clearly missing its electricity saving target

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The Swiss are top when it comes to saving gas, but a flop when it comes to saving electricity. The country clearly misses the energy-saving target of the Bundesrat. In the winter months from October to March that should be ten percent. However, only about four percent was achieved, according to the latest figures from the federal government’s energy dashboard.

By the end of March, the country must have saved a total of 3,153 gigawatt-hours of electricity. The provisional final balance: 1252 gigawatt hours were achieved. Only 40 percent of the savings target was achieved.

Even worse than expected

An estimated 2.5 percent was saved in the past month. The 10 percent limit was not broken even once in the months before. The will to save was strongest in October at around seven percent.

Incidentally, the figures are even worse than assumed at the end of February. At that time, the energy dashboard registered a saving of about 1400 gigawatt hours. Now there are even fewer. “A correction had to be made to the February data because some of the reported data was incorrect,” explains Marianne Zünd of the Federal Office of Energy. It is provisionally also an estimate for March.

Less money for austerity campaign

Despite the weak success, it has to continue next winter with turning off the computer a bit more, turning off the lights or doing without the tumbler. Because the Bundesrat has already decided that the voluntary electricity saving target of ten percent also applies for November and December of this year.

The winter energy saving initiative will be continued accordingly. The Federal Council has approved a budget of around eleven million francs for 2023. However, parliament has yet to approve an additional appropriation of seven million Swiss francs.

The new SVP energy minister Albert Rösti (55) had originally asked for 14 million Swiss francs for the campaign, but now has to settle for less money to raise public awareness.

Source:Blick