Steinmeier presents German environmental prize to Verheyen and Vossenkaul in Aachen

Prize for climate justice and wastewater technology

On Sunday, 25 October, Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier presented the Deutsche Umweltpreis in Aachen. The award carries 500,000 euros and ranks among the most generously endowed environmental prizes in Europe. It is split equally between engineer Klaus Vossenkaul, from the Städteregion Aachen, and Hamburg lawyer Roda Verheyen. Vossenkaul is recognised for improving membrane filtration used to clean wastewater in treatment plants. Verheyen receives the prize for enforcing legal requirements aimed at greater environmental and climate justice.

Steinmeier described both laureates as role models for environmental protection. He said that every single person can make a difference, and the award was presented as recognition of individual initiative.

“They show that every single person can make a difference.”

Steinmeier's warning about the planet's fever curve

Steinmeier asked that climate protection keep high priority despite short-term political trends. He acknowledged that concerns about stability and security had likely pushed thoughts of environmental protection into the background for many people. He nonetheless argued that the climate crisis is felt acutely in Europe, describing the planet's fever curve as pointing clearly upward. He said Europe warms more than twice as fast as all other continents. Recalling the summer of 2026, he cited burning forests, temperature records, shipping that nearly stopped because of low water levels, and 16,000 additional deaths according to the Robert Koch-Institut.

“We know that we must question the way we live and do business. Why? To leave our children and grandchildren a liveable planet.”

Verheyen's warning on a 2.8-degree path

Verheyen said she was delighted by the prize but also 'extremely sad'. She pointed to United Nations projections that the Earth is heading for 2.8 degrees of warming above preindustrial levels by the end of the century. In a statement to the Deutsche Presse-Agentur she said:

“2.8 degrees, that means millions of deaths.”

She cited 16,000 heat deaths, which she said hardly anyone discusses, and set them against just under 3,000 road deaths in Germany, calling the figures unbelievable. She argued that the state, society and large emitters were acting unlawfully. She rejected the view that Germany must first secure cheap energy and set climate protection aside, calling it a 'completely wrong analysis'. She said inaction would cost far more than any protective measure and that the logistics sector alone faces billions in losses from the drying out of the Rhine.

Litigation behind the recognition

In 2015 Verheyen sued the energy company RWE on behalf of a Peruvian farmer whose home city is affected by glacier melt, which she linked to the company's CO2 emissions. After ten years of proceedings she lost in court, but the case showed that large emitters can be held liable for the consequences of climate change. In 2021 the Federal Constitutional Court declared the government's climate protection law invalid and required tighter climate targets. The Bundesstiftung Umwelt called Verheyen's work 'Pionierarbeit', or pioneering work. Steinmeier said she had campaigned to anchor climate protection in international law.