Despite numerous points of contention, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) is optimistic about the coalition summit with the Greens and the FDP on Sunday.

"I am very confident about the further modernization of the country. The coalition has big plans," said Scholz in Potsdam. He was "confident that we are now making a small leap forward with various tasks that we have set ourselves."

Scholz will meet the leaders of the traffic light coalition parties in the Chancellery on Sunday to find solutions to a whole range of issues. These include plans to expand transport routes and phase out oil and gas heating. Scholz said of the latter: "After all, as I see it, my talkative government can do it and has already found the basis for a consensus."

A controversial draft law from the Ministry of Economics by Robert Habeck (Greens) provides for stricter rules for the installation of new heating systems from 2024. According to an agreement reached by the coalition in spring 2022, from 2024 every newly installed heating system should be operated with 65 percent renewable energy - this could result in a de facto ban on new oil and gas heating systems.

Scholz: "Don't overwhelm anyone"

Climate-neutral heating is "not that trivial," said Scholz. "That's why I think it's always part of everything we do that we don't overwhelm anyone." If someone asked him whether he should quickly buy a gas heater, he would say: "Don't do it. (...) But as a legislator, I have to be fair to everyone."

FDP General Secretary Bijan Djir-Sarai insisted that citizens should not be burdened any further, "neither with tax increases nor with a hasty ban on oil and gas heating". He told the dpa: "Climate protection policy must be open to technology and take people and business with us so that we can achieve climate neutrality without increasing polarization in society."

Like Scholz, Green leader Omid Nouripour is optimistic about the deliberations of the coalition committee, which includes the party and faction leaders of the three traffic light parties as well as the chancellor and several ministers - a total of around 20 politicians. On the sidelines of a state party conference of the Schleswig-Holstein Greens in Neumünster, Nouripour made it clear that he expected solutions to controversial issues. "We will also deliver this time," he told journalists. "It is only necessary to turn off the nuances and the loud tones in between until a solution is found."

The coalition will be in working mode on Sunday, Nouripour said. "I'm in good spirits that we'll deliver results tomorrow." As an example, he named planning accelerations. Germany is far too slow in implementing projects. This paralyzes modernization, for example in digitization, climate protection and the expansion of renewable energies.