Germany has hit something like 50%* renewable energy production (averaged over a full year), thanks to the €600B+ Energiewende (“energy turn”). This causes a bunch of problems. A big one is grid instability. By subsidizing rooftop solar so much, grid operators often need to pay neighbouring countries to take additional electricity in the early afternoon. During peak load in the mornings and evenings, as well as overnight, the German grid often gets lots of power from those same neighbouring countries. They have higher baseload capacities and can fill the dips between German supply and load. There is basically no storage capacity to speak of to help with these supply/demand gaps. Pumped hydro is all but a no-go due to NIMBYs and environmental protection. Hydrogen generation hasn’t qualified for subsidies and has had to pay the renewables surcharge on electricity, making it too expensive.
Germany also pressures France to drop nuclear, even though the southern Rhine region (big industrial areas) rely on French nuclear to keep the lights on. The Swiss succumbed to German pressure to phase out nuclear. Both countries will be decommissioning reactors well before their> best-before dates. We can only hope that Poland and Czechia don’t succumb to this same pressure to scrap their nuclear plans.
/* It’s also worth noting what Germany and the EU count as renewable. Much of this 50% renewable production (up to 40% if I’m not mistaken) comes from “biomass.” This biomass is in large part wood pellets, which used to be sourced from European sawmill and forestry scraps. Then it got labeled as renewable and valid for subsidies, meaning demand quickly outpaced supply. Who stepped up to meet this newfound wood demand but the US. They plant some quickly growing trees, cut them down as soon as possible, throw them in a shredder, glue and compress them into pellets, and ship them across the Atlantic where the Germans and others burn them. This whole process emits about as much CO2 as coal, yet per EU regulation is CO2 neutral, as the tree ostensibly absorbed just as much CO2 when it was growing as is released by burning.
Germany has hit something like 50%* renewable energy production (averaged over a full year), thanks to the €600B+ Energiewende (“energy turn”). This causes a bunch of problems. A big one is grid instability. By subsidizing rooftop solar so much, grid operators often need to pay neighbouring countries to take additional electricity in the early afternoon. During peak load in the mornings and evenings, as well as overnight, the German grid often gets lots of power from those same neighbouring countries. They have higher baseload capacities and can fill the dips between German supply and load. There is basically no storage capacity to speak of to help with these supply/demand gaps. Pumped hydro is all but a no-go due to NIMBYs and environmental protection. Hydrogen generation hasn’t qualified for subsidies and has had to pay the renewables surcharge on electricity, making it too expensive.
Germany also pressures France to drop nuclear, even though the southern Rhine region (big industrial areas) rely on French nuclear to keep the lights on. The Swiss succumbed to German pressure to phase out nuclear. Both countries will be decommissioning reactors well before their> best-before dates. We can only hope that Poland and Czechia don’t succumb to this same pressure to scrap their nuclear plans.
/* It’s also worth noting what Germany and the EU count as renewable. Much of this 50% renewable production (up to 40% if I’m not mistaken) comes from “biomass.” This biomass is in large part wood pellets, which used to be sourced from European sawmill and forestry scraps. Then it got labeled as renewable and valid for subsidies, meaning demand quickly outpaced supply. Who stepped up to meet this newfound wood demand but the US. They plant some quickly growing trees, cut them down as soon as possible, throw them in a shredder, glue and compress them into pellets, and ship them across the Atlantic where the Germans and others burn them. This whole process emits about as much CO2 as coal, yet per EU regulation is CO2 neutral, as the tree ostensibly absorbed just as much CO2 when it was growing as is released by burning.
Yeah, the whole policy is completely incoherent.