"A unique model"

Käthe & Paul: Mr Jorberg, what is your personal connection to energy cooperatives?

Thomas Jorberg: I grew up professionally with the cooperative GLS Bank. The cooperative principle is fundamentally linked to a mission to promote certain goals. This includes investing money in ways that align with those goals. After the Chernobyl nuclear accident, many people – including the founders of Prokon – saw a secure and clean energy supply as part of that mission. The GLS Bank has been involved in this area since the early 1990s.

K & P: What is special about the cooperative model?

Jorberg: The cooperative is the only economic organisational form where, as a shareholder, you don’t take the potential value with you when you leave. There may be a dividend in between and the return of your contribution in the end, but the future value remains within the cooperative enterprise. That means: the cooperative belongs to its members, but it essentially serves the defined promotional purpose.

K & P: Doesn’t that take far too long?

Jorberg: Essentially, it’s an infrastructure issue. The raw materials – wind and sun – are already there, they just need to be converted, transported and controlled. This is about investment, not ongoing costs. Over the past 20 years, we’ve seen such rapid technological development in this field – I’m convinced it can go faster and become cheaper than many claim.

K & P: But someone has to pay for it – and not everyone can afford green electricity even now.

Jorberg: That’s due to segmentation. From landowners to marketing companies, there’s often a gold rush mentality: everyone wants to earn as much as possible at every stage – that drives up the system’s cost, and ultimately everything ends up in the electricity price.

K & P: How can that be solved?

Jorberg: The cooperative mission should cover the entire value chain – from project planning through construction and operation all the way to direct marketing to customers. I envisage a cross-functional collaboration of energy cooperatives, where each contributes its individual strengths. Such an “Associative Energy Cooperative” would have the necessary societal and economic relevance, and could use cost advantages to demonstrate that directly supplied green electricity is affordable even for average earners. If the key players join forces in a cooperative alliance, we could easily reach one million electricity customers. That would also make it attractive for investors. This way, energy cooperatives could become a true benchmark – safe, climate-friendly, peaceful and affordable. Ultimately, it’s also a peace project, because energy policy resilience prevents conflicts over securing resources.