I recall talking to some europeans and they said they like their driers, which only half dry clothes (they put them up on a line to finish) but use less energy. It's some sort of virtue thing, I guess.
my Miele drier does not half-dry clothes.
Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
61–70 of 397 posts
Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
#62I'm rather a noob in the topic, but I've been reading in recent months about energy market and it seems like a collective insanity in the light of the climate crisis. - In most(whole?) Europe, electricity used by trains is taxed higher than jet fuel used by planes (legacy measure from decades ago which was meant to boost air market; of course now it's hugely difficult to change it) - Germany went strongly into renewa…
> In fact Germany even recently invested in new coal powered plants. Any sources on this? In Australia in the past few weeks Germany is given as an ideal example of a country decommissioning all of its coal mines and power plants.
The UK is a better example.
Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
#63Can somebody explain why electricity rates would go negative? That blows my mind. Edit: also why don’t they just mine some coins?
The renewable generators get a subsidy for each kWh that they pump on to the grid. The logical thing to do if electricity were oversupplied, i.e. you have to pay people to take it, would be to temporarily shut down some renewable generation, but then the renewable providers would lose out on the subsidy for those kWh.
Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
Bizarre that you were downvoted, when your point is spot on. Yes, heating with a big electric radiator is wasteful. Heating with a heat pump, on the other hand, is fantastically efficient.
Yes if you analyze it thermodynamically heating via natural gas is terrible. You're taking a high quality source of energy (a flame at 3500 degF) and turning it into the thermodynamic equivalent of garbage (hot air at 70 degF). All the work it could have done (say generating electricity) is tossed.
Which is where district heating comes in. Utilities, who unlike households are fully exposed to fluctuations of the electricity market, are increasingly switching their cogen pants to decoupled operation where large heat storage elements are added so that the plant can run as a peaker plant. It's not glamorous because they are still burning fossil fuel, but it's a huge improvement not only over separate burning for heat but also over synchronous cogen that would follow the heart demand. It's even a reasonable long term investment because a fully decarbonized economy would shave supply peaks with power-to-gas.
Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
#65"Only turbines built in 2016 or later take even a small hit to their revenues if prices go below zero, and more than 75 % of the production capacity was built before that." That seems like a recipe for folks just building endlessly regardless of demand, pulling money from government... and an eventual mess when you fix it and nobody is making money suddenly...
> building endlessly regardless of demand, pulling money from government
But that's not what happens. Germany has a tight control over how much is build every year. Actually there are lots of complaints that currently Germany builds not enough renewable energy capacity per year.
Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
#66I recall talking to some europeans and they said they like their driers, which only half dry clothes (they put them up on a line to finish) but use less energy. It's some sort of virtue thing, I guess.
Overdrying clothes damages them. Hang-drying clothes increases the clothes' longevity.
This guy launders!
(Joking aside yes this is completely correct.)
Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
#67I'm rather a noob in the topic, but I've been reading in recent months about energy market and it seems like a collective insanity in the light of the climate crisis. - In most(whole?) Europe, electricity used by trains is taxed higher than jet fuel used by planes (legacy measure from decades ago which was meant to boost air market; of course now it's hugely difficult to change it) - Germany went strongly into renewa…
> In fact Germany even recently invested in new coal powered plants. Any sources on this? In Australia in the past few weeks Germany is given as an ideal example of a country decommissioning all of its coal mines and power plants.
It's being done by the biggest power utility in Germany: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-13/germany-s...
You're not hearing about it because it's very embarrassing to Germans, as it should be in my honest opinion. I get that Germans have a very unique and real perspective on the use of nuclear power. I get that nuclear power has very real and serious risks. It's still done less harm to the planet and the things that live on it than the use of coal. Furthermore, the forced dependence on fossil fuels as a result of shunning nuclear power has all kinds of add on effects. There's no Germany without Russian gas, and Putin knows it.
Maybe I am wrong, but the way I see it Germany is sacrificing the overall less negatively impactful option (nuclear power) for fossil fuel because they are unwilling or unable to confront the cultural stance on use of nuclear power. That's the norm for cultures so I don't blame them for it, but I do think it's leading to the wrong choice here.
Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
#68Can somebody explain why electricity rates would go negative? That blows my mind. Edit: also why don’t they just mine some coins?
The electricity rate only for short-term traded electricity goes negative. Much of the volume is on long-term contracts.
Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
I couldn't disagree more. Electric heating via heat pump is ridiculously efficient and has a much bigger bang for your carbon-reducing buck than anything else a homeowner can do.
> Electric heating via heat pump is ridiculously efficient Strictly speaking that's "electrically assisted" heating. What most people refer to as electric heating is the conversion of electricity directly into heat, eg. by a resistive element.
You're claiming that when mostly people say "electric heating" they are specifically excluding heat pumps? Do you have something to back that up?
Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
> In fact Germany even recently invested in new coal powered plants. Any sources on this? In Australia in the past few weeks Germany is given as an ideal example of a country decommissioning all of its coal mines and power plants.
It's being done by the biggest power utility in Germany: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-13/germany-s... You're not hearing about it because it's very embarrassing to Germans, as it should be in my honest opinion. I get that Germans have a very unique and real perspective on the use of nuclear power. I get that nuclear power has very real and serious risks. It's still done less harm to the planet and…
> but the way I see it Germany is sacrificing the overall less negatively impactful option (nuclear power) for fossil fuel
but we don't. Fossil fuel consumption for electricity production is going down.