Germany has demolished what was described as its most modern coal-fired power plant — a facility barely six years old, built at a cost of roughly three billion euros, and capable of producing one thousand six hundred and fifty megawatts of electricity.

The decision was celebrated as progress.

The consequences, however, are proving harder to applaud.

At a time when Germany’s economy is struggling, industrial output is weakening, and energy prices are pressuring households and manufacturers alike, the deliberate removal of reliable baseload power raises an uncomfortable question.

Was this energy policy, or performance art?

Coal is unfashionable in Berlin.

It clashes with climate narratives, political branding, and the moral signaling expected of a modern European power.

So the plant was not mothballed, not retained as backup, but physically erased.

A functioning asset was treated as an ideological embarrassment, not an economic tool.

Meanwhile, China continues to do something deeply unfashionable but strategically effective.

It builds energy.

Reports indicate that China is adding roughly two new coal-fired power plants every week, not because it is unaware of climate debates, but because it understands a basic principle of sovereignty: no energy, no industry; no industry, no power.

The result is predictable.

As Germany constrains itself, manufacturing competitiveness drifts east.

Industrial production follows energy abundance, not speeches.

Global influence follows production, not press conferences.

This is not an argument for pollution.

It is an argument against self-inflicted weakness.

Germany did not demolish an outdated relic; it demolished optionality.

In a world growing more volatile, energy redundancy is not a sin — it is insurance.

History rarely remembers intentions.

It remembers outcomes.

And the outcome of destroying a young, high-capacity power plant while competitors expand theirs is not leadership.

It is retreat, dressed up as virtue.