Curriculum Vitae
Josef Göppel
Josef Göppel was born on 16 August 1950 on a small farm in the Franconian village of Rauenzell near Ansbach. He grew up with a strong attachment to the land and became a forester. He worked as a forestry engineer for 28 years – mostly outdoors. Göppel is married and has four daughters.
In 1972, he became involved in the local politics of his home region. After eight years in the Bavarian State Parliament, he was elected directly to the German Bundestag in 2002. All his political activities focus on living and working in harmony with nature.
Göppel has been the head of the CSU’s environmental working group since 1991, and has played a significant role in shaping the party’s environmental platform. Within the party, he has a reputation as a sometimes difficult and persistent unconventional thinker. The media regard him as the green conscience of his party.
As a forestry engineer, in 1986 he founded the Land Care Association of Middle Franconia. His aim was to overcome the bitter divisions that existed at that time between environmentalists and farmers. The initiative became a success, and today there are 155 Land Care Associations in 14 German Länder, with equal representation of farmers, conservationists and local politicians. Göppel has been head of the German Association for Landcare since 1993. The network Landcare Europe was founded at EU level in 2016.
In the mid-90s he joined the International Eco-Social Forum and worked on the Global Marshall Plan Initiative.
In 2005 he founded the Renewable Energies Network in the Middle Franconia region together with business representatives, craftspeople and scientists. In 2014 this led to the creation of the Franconia Regional Electricity cooperative, which aims to sell electricity directly to those in the immediate vicinity of the production sites.
He stood firmly by Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel in 2015, when her generous policy of receiving Syrian refugees came under harsh criticism from the CDU and CSU.
A key cross-party initiative in the German Bundestag can be traced back to Göppel: members of government and opposition parties joined forces in the Future Forum on the Environment, where they made the case for more sustainable environmental policies.
In the Bundestag elections, Göppel’s personal votes have far surpassed the second votes for his party every time; in 2013, the figures stood at 53.3 percent to 47.6 percent.
An outsider’s view proves revealing – the following text appeared in the local press after an appearance at the Nürnberger Presseclub:
"Göppel is a true conservative. He wants nothing more than to preserve creation. The CSU Member of the Bundestag approaches politics through the lenses of his Christian faith and his long experience working with nature. He has been known to get on the wrong side of people, whether it be his fellow party members or supporters of conventional growth policies. He was the only member of the CSU to vote against generating electricity from nuclear power in Germany long before the start of the energy transition."
Political Career
•1972-2004 Herrieden town council
•1974-1994 Middle Franconia District Council
•since 1991 Chairman of the CSU environmental working group
•1986 founded the first Land Care Association
•1994-2002 Bavarian State Parliament
•since 1996 Ansbach county council
•since 2002 German Bundestag
The “Franconia Regional Electricity” energy cooperative brings together producers and supplies electricity to municipal utility companies
The first energy cooperative in Germany supplying regionally produced green electricity directly to final customers via the municipal utility companies has been established in Central Franconia. It means that the electricity does not have to be traded via the Leipzig Energy Exchange. The electricity flows via the existing grid directly to the customers. Thus, the physical route taken by the electricity is also reflected in terms of the commercial transactions taking place.
At the inaugural meeting, 80 electricity producers joined the new cooperative. Commercial operations are beginning with those plants which are already legally obliged to sell their electricity directly. In total, there are 27,000 decentralised electricity producers in the region covered by the new cooperative.
By paying a deposit of 100 euros, small-scale producers gain the right to sell their electricity as part of the cooperative. The tried-and-tested principle in cooperatives of “one member one vote” applies. The idea behind the “Electricity from the region for the region” model is to set in motion a sustainable regional business cycle and develop an urban-rural partnership. In this way, a regional combined-cycle power plant is created which is only dependent to a small extent on balancing electricity from other sources. With 40% of its electricity coming from biogas plants whose output can be adapted in line with demand, the cooperative can react flexibly to the needs of the different municipal utility companies.
Dr Peter Pluschke, responsible for environment policy in Nuremberg, summed it up neatly: “Your concept and our expectations are in tune with each other.” He said that, in line with the 2050 urban energy strategy, the proportion of electricity in Nuremberg supplied from the surrounding region was expected to rise to 50%; the amount of energy consumed in the city was 3400 gigawatt hours per year, whilst the 27,000 green electricity plants in West Central Franconia produced around 1600 gigawatt hours in 2013.
At the inaugural meeting, economist Robert Spanheimer (38), who had already been involved in establishing energy cooperatives in the Rhön region, was elected as chair of the board. The supervisory board is represented by 64-year-old Josef Göppel, who took the initiative in setting up the cooperative. He believes that “feeding in the aggregated energy produced by small-scale producers ensures a reliable market for sales even after the 20-year feed-in period under the Renewable Energy Sources Act. The regional energy pool at local level provides customers with security of supply and long-term savings on grid costs.” Göppel emphasises that this model leaves the transformation of the energy system (Energiewende) in the hands of citizens, rather than it being left to large corporations with anonymous shareholders. He points out that regional supply via the municipal utility companies is particularly important, because these companies can motivate their customers to adapt their consumption to a certain extent to supply. And he stresses that additional cogeneration, decentralised storage facilities and energy conservation contracting are part of a regional value-creation strategy. He underlines the fact that this type of energy economy is transparent and easily comprehensible for customers, and that it gives electricity a “face”.
The corporate philosophy agreed at the first general meeting defines as the top priority the development of a regional energy economy by means of a community based on solidarity between producers and consumers, as well as between regional and urban areas in Franconia. Nuremberg’s mayor, Dr Ulrich Maly, supports the initiative from the environs of his city. He believes that it has the potential to speed up the integration of renewable energy into the market and sees it as a real step forward in the transformation of the energy system.
In order to provide a firm foundation for the model from Central Franconia in other places, the system of legal guarantees of origin for electricity must be extended to cover regional direct sales. The amendments to the Renewable Energy Sources Act made in 2014 give Energy Minister Sigmar Gabriel the authority to issue an ordinance to this effect.