My name is Thomas Clemens Rawert and I’m currently 49 years old. I work as a systems developer in the data centre of an international insurance group in the Euregio.
I’m married and the father of a daughter who is now 27.
In my spare time I’m interested in meteorology, e-mobility, home automation and role-playing games. The imagination they require is a wonderful counterbalance to my rather dry working life.
I moved to Gangelt-Hastenrath in 2011, as my wife and daughter come from here. Having grown up in Coesfeld in the Münsterland, a rural county town, I feel more at home here than in the hustle and bustle of a big city, which I got to know while studying in Dortmund. After a work-related detour of about seven years to Eschweiler, we moved back to Gangelt – to Birgden this time – in October last year. For me, it felt like coming home.
In my view, the greatest threat to the prosperity and well-being of our society is man-made climate change with all its consequences. The extreme weather of every kind that it brings endangers both. Of all the parties in Germany, Bündnis 90/Die Grünen seems to me the only one that is seriously pursuing policies whose primary aim is to counter this. That’s why I decided to stand as a candidate for the party, even though I’m not a member, and to support its policies in this way.
For me, the shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy is the key to tackling climate change. Expanding solar and wind power – along with the energy storage that is urgently needed to hold surplus power for “dark doldrums” and to stabilise local grids – is of central importance to me. Switching to e-mobility not only reduces local emissions (noise and exhaust fumes), it also makes us less dependent on imports of fossil fuels, on which billions have to be spent every year. What’s more, the batteries of electric cars can help to stabilise the power grid if they are charged in a grid-friendly way and the legal framework is created for feeding that energy back into the grid. The storage capacity of the electric cars registered in Germany already exceeds that of all existing pumped-storage power stations – enormous potential that should be tapped. Fair payment for electricity fed into the grid could encourage people to become an active part of the energy transition and to see it not just as a cost, but as a way not only to save money – for example by investing in their own solar panels – but also to earn money by feeding power into the grid.
At municipal level, a community wind turbine would allow people to take part in the energy transition who, for example, don’t own a home and therefore have no other way to invest in renewables and lower their energy costs. Building a battery storage facility would be the municipality’s contribution to grid stability, as the green electricity generated locally could then be stored and fed back in on site without having to expand the grid itself.
The fear of migration that some people are stirring up worries many in Germany these days. I believe that Germany cannot survive without immigration. Many people with a so-called “migration background” do essential and important jobs in our country and, through their commitment and their work, support and sustain our society. We must therefore not close ourselves off to immigration, but should maintain an open culture of welcome in which those in need of protection can also find our support. When large parts of the world become uninhabitable because of rising temperatures or other consequences of climate change, the people living there are driven out as well. Active climate protection can therefore also help to reduce the causes of migration.
My ward covers the following streets:
- Amselstraße
- Asternstraße
- Christian-Küppers-Straße
- Drosselweg
- Fasanenstraße
- Finkenstraße
- Fliederstraße
- Heinrich-Aretz-Straße
- Im Unkelsfeld
- Josef-Sondermanns-Straße
- Lerchenring
- Paulssträßchen
- Sohland-Straße
- Schniewind-Straße
- Seidenstraße
- Rosenweg
- Waldkauzstraße
- Wilhelm-Frings-Straße
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