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Lützerath: How Germany's energy crisis reignited coal

Germany had been winding down its brown coal production. Then an energy crisis hit. Now, thousands of people have promised to resist January plans to demolish a village and dig up the coal beneath it.

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"If this village goes, then Germany's 1.5-degrees commitment to the Paris Agreement goes, as well."

It's an October afternoon in a rural corner of western Germany, the village of Lützerath in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW). The morning rain clouds have moved out, and the sun is glistening off the damp grass and leaves in the small meadow where we're walking.

Scattered among the tall trees, small makeshift houses on raised wooden platforms loom over us in all directions. A couple of people move around on the ground below. Just out of sight, 200 meters (220 yards) away, is Garzweiler II, one of Europe's largest coal pits.

"It's a very, very important space, not only as a symbol, as many politicians tend to say," Alma (family name withheld), the press officer for the initiative Alle Dörfer Bleiben (All Villages Stay), tells DW on a tour of the village. "It's a very practical place of climate justice because there is so much coal below."

Lützerath has been occupied by protesters since 2020, when plans emerged to demolish the village and dig up the brown coal — or lignite — beneath it. Since the end of World War II, around 300 towns in Germany have been demolished for lignite mining, causing more than 120,000 people to be resettled.

In recent years, aside from activists, only one farmer and a few tenants were still living in Lützerath. A visit to the town reveals little more than one main road and a dozen old, brick farm houses covered in protest graffiti.

But it's not just about saving the town, people opposing the demolition say. It's about keeping coal in the ground. Globally, coal is still the largest source of electricity generation as well as the largest source of carbon dioxide. In 2021, around 30% of Germany's electricity was generated by burning coal.