The German Environmental Award of the Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt (DBU) has been presented in late October in Bremen. With an endowment of each 245,000 Euro the entrepreneurial duo Dr. Winfried Barkhausen and Edwin Büchter from Herzogenrath and Dr. Rainer Grießhammer from the Öko-Institut in Freiburg were awarded. The Honorary Award was awarded the former president of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev.
At the award ceremony at the Musical Theater Bremen President Christian Wulff said that the latest award winners showed what was necessary for sustainable development: "ground-breaking innovations, bold investments in future technologies, far-sighted and responsible decision-makers in politics and economy and a social awareness of how urgent the transformation to an ecologically acceptable way of life is.” In this respect, this ceremony has "a message that can give us great hope: We can do much better – already today".
Addressing the winners Barkhausen and Büchter, Jochen Flasbarth, president of the Federal Environment Agency and jury member, said that the jury was particularly impressed that two researchers had made their way with the founding of a company to transfer innovation in business processes. The cleaning of technical surfaces with laser light has enormous advantages compared with conventional methods because it reduces the water consumption and chemicals use in the production process and helps saving a lot of energy – in this way savings of up to 87 percent were possible.
Looking at Rainer Grießhammer said Prof. Dr. Ernst Ulrich von Weizsacker, jury member and former environmental award winner, he was the “leading personality of the Öko-Institut", which he helped develop to one of the most important institutions in environmental protection. Grießhammer had understood that the consumer should comprehend ecological contexts if he wanted really evaluate products and then make buying decisions. The eco-assessment of detergents introduced by Grießhammer had launched the chemical change.
Hubert Weinzierl, Chairman of the DBU Board, praised Gorbachev as architect of the fall of the Iron Curtain, whom he had always been ecologically on the same wavelength with. By Gorbachev, it became possible to preserve the "Green Belt" along the former inner-German border. The perseverance in this effort for a consistent environmental protection was in any case worthwhile.
Gorbachev said that policy was not working without ecology. Among the many existing problems the subject of ecology was "in the front rank”.
The ceremony was hosted by Katrin Bauerfeind (3sat).
