Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) has not ruled out that the tank discount can also lead to higher fuel prices – “if everyone drives to the gas station on June 1st”. Then the demand would be much greater “and petrol suddenly became an even more valuable commodity and then we lowered the price, but in reality it is going up,” Habeck told RTL / ntv on Friday.

That would then depend on what is happening on the market and would “calm down again,” Habeck said. From June 1st there will be a reduction in the energy tax on fuels. According to the Federal Ministry of Finance, this should make petrol 35.2 cents cheaper and diesel 16.7 cents.

The gas station industry has already warned of bottlenecks. With the price reduction, high demand from motorists meets a shortage of supply. The tank discount will be valid for three months until the end of August.

According to Habeck, the fight against climate change can only be about limiting global warming. “There will always be global warming,” he said on Friday in Berlin at the end of the meeting of the environment, energy and climate protection ministers of the G7 industrialized countries. Germany currently chairs the group, which also includes France, Italy, Japan, Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom.

“It may still be possible for us to repair the mistakes of the past. It’s impossible for us to undo them,” Habeck said. “No more global warming is no longer an option.” The only question at stake is whether decisive political action will succeed in slowing down global warming within the next four, five, eight or ten years to such an extent that it will then “at all there are still options for action”.

According to a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change published in early April, global emissions of greenhouse gases between 2010 and 2019 were higher than ever before in human history. The growth rate has slowed down. But without immediate reductions in emissions, the goal enshrined in the Paris climate agreement of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees compared to the pre-industrial age can no longer be achieved.