Germany's abandonment of nuclear power is a risky strategy, the new head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said in an interview with website Spiegel Online released on Thursday.
IEA executive director Maria van der Hoeven said that the policy announced by Chancellor Angela Merkel would show itself especially problematic in the coming colder months.
"I consider the German way risky…. This winter it will be difficult for German network operators to keep the voltage stable," she said.
Merkel shut down eight of Germany's nuclear power generators in the wake of March's disaster at the Fukushima plant in Japan, and later said all its remaining nuclear capacity would be taken off the grid by 2022.
The eight plants now closed represent over 8,000 MW of generating capacity.
The sudden U-turn in policy — before Fukushima Merkel had planned on longer use of nuclear power — weighed on GDP in the second quarter, leading quarterly economic growth to slow to 0.1 percent in April-June.
In her interview, van der Hoeven said the IEA hoped to improve the transparency of oil markets by improving an early warning system to identify when oil prices could spike.
"We want to know earlier when supply and demand diverge, that's to say when the risk for oil shortages and price rises exist," she said.
"The IEA cannot dictate prices to oil producers. It would go beyond our mandate. But it is true that oil prices are so high they are dragging on global growth."
