Germany Continues To Wrestle with Heavy Push to Clean Energy
Here’s the last of a five-part series on the migration from fossil fuels to renewable energy, discussing what’s happening in Germany as these folks, not normally known for taking risks, continue to drive huge integration of solar and wind into their grid-mix.
The bottom line, as I guess we know already, is that there are a lot of moving parts to getting this right, including energy transmission, rethinking the need for baseload, and dynamic pricing that, in a few cases, drives energy prices negative; i.e., consumers are paid to use energy when there is too much solar and wind at the same time.
According to a spokesperson at publicly-owned German utility EnBw, “One day renewable energies will be the conventional energies of the future.” Imperfect English, but he certainly nailed it; we’re getting there.
It’s my guess that they will find it far more difficult than supporters think. The greater the penetration of renewables, the greater the difficulty. Starting from scratch, the first 10% is easy but from there it becomes progressively more difficult.
Craig,
Sorry to comment on your article. Please remove the word “conservative”. In the US this is a emotional word and politically associated with a party in the US. No similar party exits is Germany.
It gives a wrong idea what average Germans are and is therefore misleading. I read some answers on quora about conservatives in America for the moment and it is something that we do not understand in Europe.
The switch to a sustainable electricity grid is something a lot of Germans believe in. It is a very long road and it is only the beginning. How and when it will end is anybodies guess. It is not easy.
Furthermore you should not separate the Germans. I am not German, but live in West-Europe. The electrical grid in the whole European Union is interconnected. Any problem with the grid in Germany will affect the whole of Europe.
While a lot of countries in Europe are not as advanced as Germany in the deployment of wind and solar we (Europe) are all in this journey together. Furthermore Germany is not the champion in Europe for the share of renewables in the grid.
Denmark has a lot more wind share than Germany. Norway has a lot more hydro. Portugal also has more renewable share than Germany thanks to hydro. France is probably the lowest carbon content/kWh due to the high amount of nuclear.
You should not consider those grids separate as all are interconnected. I do not think the grid in Germany would be stable as it is now if it was separate. I known the Germans are looking for battery storage as part of the solution, but it is expensive.
We will see how it evolves. It is an interesting transition which not many generations have or will see. Negative electricity prices are quite exceptional. I sometimes lookup the wholesale electricity prices in Germany. I have the impression I see less of them the last year. I general the wholesale electricity prices seem to go up this winter.
Mark
OK, I’ve made the change. I can assure you, however, that the word “conservative” has a broader meaning than the nuttiness in present-day U.S. politics. I’m also sure that the Germans consider themselves conservative under this more common definition. Thus the phrase “sicher ist sicher.” (Sure is sure.)
Craig,
It’s true that in Germany and Scandinavia the concept of ‘Energiewende’ was very popular.
However, recently support is wavering. While renewable power remains popular with Norwegians and Danes mainly due to hydro, the Swedes are re-thinking their policy of closing Nuclear power generation.
In Germany and France dissent is beginning to get louder, especially since Swiss voters overwhelmingly supported the retention of nuclear power generation.
The doubts began as German consumers, especially industrial consumers, started realizing the dramatically rising cost of energy. No matter how the German government disguised the costs, or masked the reasons with subsidies, incentives and dubious accounting it’s become increasingly obvious renewable can’t perform to expectations.
This winter, even France is heavily dependent on power imports from Germany. This is despite most of the country’s nuclear reactors being back online following the problems caused by Areva.
This winter Germany is totally reliant on aging fossil fuel generation plants. Some of these facilities, once mothballed by Nuclear generation, have now been reactivated to meet increasing demand.
Germany has become more, not less, dependent on imported Natural Gas from Eastern Europe and Russia and domestic coal production.
One of the main architects and early advocates of ‘Energiewende’ Dr Heiner Flassbeck, recently attacked the fundamental assumptions of the policy..
Dr Flassbeck is a former Director of Macroeconomics and Development at UNCTAD, a former German Federal State Secretary of Finance.
Dr Flassbeck’s report concludes, “Germany will never be able to rely on renewable energy, regardless how much new capacity is added”
This is quite an admission from an expert who was one of the main advocates for closing down Germany’s nuclear power industry.
It must have been very difficult for Dr Flassbeck to admit:-
” like many people, I placed high hopes in Energiewende. I never expected to see large-scale solar arrays and wind turbines, including those offshore, motionless for days on end. Data compiled by Agora Energiewende on individual types of electricity generation revealed the appalling results for sun and wind during December.
The persistent winter high-pressure system with dense fog throughout Central Europe unmasked the fairy tale of a successful energy transition.”.
Dr Flassbeck’s report has meet with some resistance and criticism, but also support from highly regarded regarded and reputable experts.
His warning that ” In 30 years ‘Energiewende’ will prove catastrophic Germany ” is dire news coming from one of it’s founders.
Dr Flassbeck must be admired for his candour and courage.
His observation :-
” You can wish for a lot and hope for good outcomes. But as important as wishes and hopes are, they are not solutions !”
“Energiewende once again demonstrates the traditional political approaches are ill-equipped to solve complex problems. Consequently, they pursue what I have recently called symbolic politics, for example; Announcing something supposed to point in the right direction, without thinking it through and without even taking note of the system-related consequences. If it goes wrong, the political predecessors were guilty, so nobody feels responsible.
That’s why citizens need to remain vigilant and critical. We must use our brains when we would prefer to turn them off, especially when the conclusions are so depressing”.
Wise words from a man who has the courage and honesty to admit his mistakes.
None of the above makes Dr Flassbeck an oracle, and there were those at the Davos Convention, especially from the Wind and Solar industry, who disagreed with his conclusions.
However,Heiner Flassbeck revelations must give pause for thought, and a more critical reassement of ‘Energiewende’.
@ Marco and Mark
You both shed light into a complex and Big transition policy that is still in its development. You share some insights into some details and challenges that does not get the Press and discussion necessary to actually learn what works and what needs more work.
Marco your sharing of what Dr Flassbeck has shared with his assessment report is sobering and you present it quite well.
I like renewables etc and see a long future for them but there is much work to be done.
it is true like Mark said that as long as the West European Grid is interconnected then it can provide the diversity in load as well as reserves to bail out the GAP when the RE is not performing.
From this information and some other I have read, Germany on a individual basis would be in tight spots were it not for the inter Regional Grid connections and load & resource diversity.
In the US the WECC Western Electric Coordinating Council which covers almost 40 to 45 % of the US land mass can absorb large volumes of RE supplies because of the large area creates large diversity and robust mix of resources and dispersed demand load centers, etc. So things are easier to Balance out compared to other Regions.
Despite being Self contained and a Isolated Grid the Texas ERCOT region which is quite large land mass with both dense and sparcely populated areas is doing very well in integrating large volumes of both Wind & now Solar resources with more positive results than once were thought possible. The Grid is actually realizing significant in the billions of operating costs and fuel savings. Again land mass and diversity of loads goes a long way.
Retirements of old coal continue and the addition of newer more efficient and load following GAS CC units compliment the resource Mix. Better Sun – solar resources helps too. The Petro chemical complexes in Houston and Corpus Christi area provide surplus 24 / 7 power from large Co generation plants. So that is a Wild Card asset that most regions don’t possess to be fair. .
Perhaps Germany is a Ripe candidate for SMR’s when they appear on market place perhaps. This of course may not be politically correct at this time ? Maybe that is the only way to shut down the old dirty coal or reduce the imported gas from Russia to maintain reliability. From a Global Warming Green House Gas point of view I have always wondered why they did not try to utilize their existing or some of their existing nuclear assets longer. They decided to close them ( political pressures) and continue to rely on coal even though the carbon off sets the improvements in air quality the clean energy provides.
They do cling to coal usage for mining jobs – political trade off perhaps , like certain voices want to do in the US ! So that is one of the layers of complexity that injects itself into the equation.
Germany is collaborating with Russia for a new pipeline under the Baltic so they can import more Gas. Maybe that will allow them to support larger deployments of CHP plants that fit into the RE / CHP / Battery Mix of Micro grids.
Very balanced presentation Marco . Thank you, learned some new insights into the German Challenges. Is Dr. H. Flassbeck’s report available online?
It is interesting that sometimes in Germany solar and wind systems are idle for days on end. That should not be a surprise. I became concerned about that here in the U.S. when I took a motorcycle trip from here in Albuquerque, NM to Savannah, GA and back in 2009 and noticed many idle wind farms. It has been known for thousands of years that the wind does not always blow and the sun does not always shine; that is not new information.
As I have stated a number of times, before implementing an energy system, there should be careful and long-term studies to evaluate their potential. An adequate study for solar and wind power would require installing wind and solar sensors in many of the locations where actual installations would be reasonable. Then, for a period of AT LEAST a year, the data gathered would be analyzed to determine whether installing actual systems and interconnecting them would provide adequate and reliable power. It would also reveal how much storage would be required to provide adequate and reliable power.
Obviously the above study would be very expensive, but it would be far less costly than building real systems THEN finding out that they are incapable of doing the job. It seems unwise to begin implementing huge renewable energy systems BEFORE doing adequate studies to evaluate their practicality.
I could be mistaken, but I strongly suspect that before too many years we will find out that because of failure to do adequate studies first, we have spent huge amounts of money on a technology which is practical only for niche applications. Moreover, the delay in rapidly expanding nuclear power will have reduced the likelihood that we can get global warming under control before it causes exceedingly serious problems. The catastrophe could be far greater than anything we have ever experienced, including the European plagues in the middle ages which killed over half of the people in some areas.