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Skip next section What you need to know
What you need to know
- Solar energy output in Germany is drawing close a record total of more than 100 terawatt-hours in a single calendar year
- Economics experts are warning that the country is living beyond its means
- Health care cuts mean people might have to pay privately to avoid long waiting times, says the national association for statutory physicians
- Experts in Germany have warned against too much reliance on a sole provider after a major outage at Microsoft affected German businesses
This is a roundup of the top stories from and about Germany on November 14, 2026:
Skip next section Budget crisis looming if spending is not cut — experts11/14/2026November 14, 2026
Budget crisis looming if spending is not cut — experts
Leading economics experts have predicted a serious German budget crisis from next year if the issue of spending is not addressed.
Their remarks come as the budget committee of the Bundestag, the lower house of parliament, early on Friday approved a provisional 2027 federal budget after nearly 16 hours of negotiations.
The budget foresees new debt, including loans from special funds, totalling around €210 billion ($231.5 billion).
Spending in the core budget rises to a record €561 billion, while net borrowing climbs to almost €123 billion in the core budget alone.
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“This budget policy cannot be sustained in the long term,” Clemens Fuest, president of the Ifo Institute in Munich, told the Sunday edition of Die Welt newspaper, saying spending priorities had to be established
“All other spending should be frozen or, if possible, cut,” Fuest said, adding that tax rises would be inevitable if this did not happen.
Jens Boysen-Hogrefe of the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel) sees things similarly.
“Owing to economic fluctuations and special effects, there may be some breathing room in individual years, but the trend is clearly negative,” he said, owing to the fact that the population is aging while interest payments are rising.
“Additional levies are likely even with strong spending discipline,” he said.
Ansgar Heveling, the president of the Bundesrechnungshof, the federal audit court that monitors financial management by the government, called on the coalition government to do make more effort to consolidate the budget.
Noting that every third euro spent by the government is financed by borrowing, he said it was clear that it was living beyond its means, and warned that the share of interest spending in the federal budget would double by 2020.
Edited by:Saim Dušan Inayatullahhttps://p.dw.com/p/5PS5uSkip next section Solar energy output set for record high in Germany in 202611/14/2026November 14, 2026
Solar energy output set for record high in Germany in 2026
An above-average number of sunshine hours and the growing number of photovoltaic facilities has contributed to solar energy production that is approaching a record total for Germany, an industry association says.
By September 27, solar energy output had reached 90.2 terawatt-hours, which is already more than the 90 terawatt-hours generated for all of 2025, according to the German Solar Association (BSW -Solar) in Berlin.
That means that solar energy in net electricity generation in Germany is likely to reach a record level of more than 100 terawatt-hours in a single calendar year — almost 10 times the amount of electricity used by a major city like Hamburg in a year.
It is also almost 50 times as much as the 2.2 terawatt-hours generated byx solar power 20 years ago.
Carsten Körnig, the managing director of BSW-Solar, said the likely record was an important milestone as the world seeks to move away from climate-changing fossil fuels.
“Photovoltaics has developed from a niche technology into a cornerstone of our electricity supply,” Körnig said.
“Society as a whole benefits from this: through cheaper electricity, fewer energy import and significantly lower climate-related damages,” he said.
At 17.8% of total power generation, photovoltaics was the third most important energy source of domestically produced electricity behind wind power — the top energy source — followed by coal.
Edited by:Saim Dušan Inayatullahhttps://p.dw.com/p/5PS2nSkip next section Welcome to our coverage11/14/2026November 14, 2026
Welcome to our coverage
Guten Tag from the DW newsroom in Bonn!
Sunny days might be getting rarer now as winter comes into sight, but this year has nonetheless been a very good one for solar energy so far, with almost a fifth of total electricity generation coming from photovoltaics.
We will be looking at that bumper solar harvest, which seems likely to hit a record high.
On a less positive note, economics experts are warning that Germany could run into big budget problems amid record high borrowing.
And another warning has come from experts in view of the latest Microsoft outage: “Don’t put all your eggs in one (tech) basket,” they are telling German businesses and government agencies.
You can read more about these and other stories in this blog covering all things German.
Edited by:Saim Dušan Inayatullahhttps://p.dw.com/p/5PS21Show more posts
