News about Germany

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Metal theft by criminal gangs in Germany is alarming the public and businesses. The resulting disruptions will worsen as copper prices rise.

German railway operator Deutsche Bahn has been struggling for quite a while now. Decades of neglect have left the state-owned company’s infrastructure and rolling stock in tatters and its finances in disarray.

Deutsche Bahn’s precarious funding is now being additionally burdened by a rising number of copper thefts that in 2022 alone cost the company about €6.6 million ($7 million), according to German business daily Handelsblatt. This year, the newspaper found, copper thefts have already led to 2,644 train delays, totaling well over 700 hours.

As criminals destroy cable ducts to get hold of the valuable base metal, supply chains are disrupted and hundreds of thousands of passengers are getting increasingly frustrated about Deutsche Bahn’s unpunctuality.

BUSINESSGERMANY
Germany: Copper theft hits crucial infrastructure, business
Dirk Kaufmann
6 hours ago6 hours ago
Metal theft by criminal gangs in Germany is alarming the public and businesses. The resulting disruptions will worsen as copper prices rise.

https://p.dw.com/p/4Wmia
An Aurubis employee checking on cooper coils in a company plant
German copper producer Aurubis identified considerable discrepancies in its target inventory during a scheduled reviewImage: Thomas Trutschel/photothek/picture alliance
ADVERTISEMENT

German railway operator Deutsche Bahn has been struggling for quite a while now. Decades of neglect have left the state-owned company’s infrastructure and rolling stock in tatters and its finances in disarray.

Deutsche Bahn’s precarious funding is now being additionally burdened by a rising number of copper thefts that in 2022 alone cost the company about €6.6 million ($7 million), according to German business daily Handelsblatt. This year, the newspaper found, copper thefts have already led to 2,644 train delays, totaling well over 700 hours.

As criminals destroy cable ducts to get hold of the valuable base metal, supply chains are disrupted and hundreds of thousands of passengers are getting increasingly frustrated about Deutsche Bahn’s unpunctuality.

A red signal next to a train line in Dortmund, Germany.A red signal next to a train line in Dortmund, Germany.
Copper thieves have stopped train lines leaving hundreds of passengers strandedImage: Bernd Thissen/dpa/picture alliance
But it’s not only the German national railway company that suffers from the rising theft of so-called nonferrous metals like copper. Copper wiring and pipes are stolen from construction sites. Even church roofs that are often laid with copper plates are no longer safe from acts of criminal wrongdoing.

The most spectacular copper theft of all time in Germany, though, happened at copper manufacturing and recycling company Aurubis in August. The Hamburg-based company disclosed it was a victim of a major theft involving nearly $200 million (€188.7 million) worth of the base metal.

https://p.dw.com/p/4Wmia
BUSINESSGERMANY
Germany: Copper theft hits crucial infrastructure, business
Dirk Kaufmann
6 hours ago6 hours ago
Metal theft by criminal gangs in Germany is alarming the public and businesses. The resulting disruptions will worsen as copper prices rise.

https://p.dw.com/p/4Wmia
An Aurubis employee checking on cooper coils in a company plant
German copper producer Aurubis identified considerable discrepancies in its target inventory during a scheduled reviewImage: Thomas Trutschel/photothek/picture alliance
ADVERTISEMENT

German railway operator Deutsche Bahn has been struggling for quite a while now. Decades of neglect have left the state-owned company’s infrastructure and rolling stock in tatters and its finances in disarray.

Deutsche Bahn’s precarious funding is now being additionally burdened by a rising number of copper thefts that in 2022 alone cost the company about €6.6 million ($7 million), according to German business daily Handelsblatt. This year, the newspaper found, copper thefts have already led to 2,644 train delays, totaling well over 700 hours.

As criminals destroy cable ducts to get hold of the valuable base metal, supply chains are disrupted and hundreds of thousands of passengers are getting increasingly frustrated about Deutsche Bahn’s unpunctuality.

A red signal next to a train line in Dortmund, Germany.A red signal next to a train line in Dortmund, Germany.
Copper thieves have stopped train lines leaving hundreds of passengers strandedImage: Bernd Thissen/dpa/picture alliance
But it’s not only the German national railway company that suffers from the rising theft of so-called nonferrous metals like copper. Copper wiring and pipes are stolen from construction sites. Even church roofs that are often laid with copper plates are no longer safe from acts of criminal wrongdoing.

The most spectacular copper theft of all time in Germany, though, happened at copper manufacturing and recycling company Aurubis in August. The Hamburg-based company disclosed it was a victim of a major theft involving nearly $200 million (€188.7 million) worth of the base metal.

Critical raw material in short supply
After the news of the theft broke at the end of August, Aurubis, Europe’s largest copper producer, said it suspected a criminal gang had stolen some of its metal. The company disclosed that due to “considerable discrepancies” in its inventories it would miss its full-year profit guidance.

Copper is a base metal that is used in multiple appliances and applications due to its good electrical conductivity. It’s become even more critical in the transformation of entire industries toward carbon neutrality, says Joachim Berlenbach, founder and CEO of the Earth Resource Investment (ERI) consultancy. He added that he has no doubt that “the demand for copper will increase massively in the future.”

“Think of a wind turbine generating electricity by spinning a copper coil through a magnetic field. For each megawatt of wind energy, you need five to nine tons of copper, depending on whether the turbine is onshore or offshore,” Berlenbach told DW.

Prices will continue to rise, he said, because “we simply don’t have enough of this critical raw material for achieving our decarbonization goals. This is often ignored by advocates of the energy transition”.

https://p.dw.com/p/4Wmia
BUSINESSGERMANY
Germany: Copper theft hits crucial infrastructure, business
Dirk Kaufmann
6 hours ago6 hours ago
Metal theft by criminal gangs in Germany is alarming the public and businesses. The resulting disruptions will worsen as copper prices rise.

https://p.dw.com/p/4Wmia
An Aurubis employee checking on cooper coils in a company plant
German copper producer Aurubis identified considerable discrepancies in its target inventory during a scheduled reviewImage: Thomas Trutschel/photothek/picture alliance
ADVERTISEMENT

German railway operator Deutsche Bahn has been struggling for quite a while now. Decades of neglect have left the state-owned company’s infrastructure and rolling stock in tatters and its finances in disarray.

Deutsche Bahn’s precarious funding is now being additionally burdened by a rising number of copper thefts that in 2022 alone cost the company about €6.6 million ($7 million), according to German business daily Handelsblatt. This year, the newspaper found, copper thefts have already led to 2,644 train delays, totaling well over 700 hours.

As criminals destroy cable ducts to get hold of the valuable base metal, supply chains are disrupted and hundreds of thousands of passengers are getting increasingly frustrated about Deutsche Bahn’s unpunctuality.

A red signal next to a train line in Dortmund, Germany.A red signal next to a train line in Dortmund, Germany.
Copper thieves have stopped train lines leaving hundreds of passengers strandedImage: Bernd Thissen/dpa/picture alliance
But it’s not only the German national railway company that suffers from the rising theft of so-called nonferrous metals like copper. Copper wiring and pipes are stolen from construction sites. Even church roofs that are often laid with copper plates are no longer safe from acts of criminal wrongdoing.

The most spectacular copper theft of all time in Germany, though, happened at copper manufacturing and recycling company Aurubis in August. The Hamburg-based company disclosed it was a victim of a major theft involving nearly $200 million (€188.7 million) worth of the base metal.

Critical raw material in short supply
After the news of the theft broke at the end of August, Aurubis, Europe’s largest copper producer, said it suspected a criminal gang had stolen some of its metal. The company disclosed that due to “considerable discrepancies” in its inventories it would miss its full-year profit guidance.

Copper is a base metal that is used in multiple appliances and applications due to its good electrical conductivity. It’s become even more critical in the transformation of entire industries toward carbon neutrality, says Joachim Berlenbach, founder and CEO of the Earth Resource Investment (ERI) consultancy. He added that he has no doubt that “the demand for copper will increase massively in the future.”

“Think of a wind turbine generating electricity by spinning a copper coil through a magnetic field. For each megawatt of wind energy, you need five to nine tons of copper, depending on whether the turbine is onshore or offshore,” Berlenbach told DW.

Prices will continue to rise, he said, because “we simply don’t have enough of this critical raw material for achieving our decarbonization goals. This is often ignored by advocates of the energy transition.”

A charging station for electric vehicles in Dinslaken , GermanyA charging station for electric vehicles in Dinslaken , Germany
Transformations in mobility and energy generation will require massive amounts of copperImage: Jochen Tack/picture alliance
Economic development to drive up copper prices
Berlenbach thinks that a main driver of future copper prices will be the economic development in emerging countries like China and India where rising standards of living will lead to “more cars being driven, more air conditioning systems being installed and more houses with better electrical wiring being constructed.”

The ERI CEO said humans have mined 700 million tons of copper in total so far. “We will need about the same amount of copper in the next 30 years,” he added, basing his assumption on calculations done at his company.

At the same time, it’s becoming “increasingly difficult to explore and mine copper deposits,” he said, noting that those are mainly to be found in countries with high geopolitical risk such as Chile and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)), where companies will only invest “if it’s economically worthwhile.”

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