Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#321

Post by logifail » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 12:28 PM UTC

diffeomorphism wrote: post #293

logifail wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The subsidies are (overly) high so that lots of renewable energy production/infrastructure is built In the first half of last year a total of 35 new wind turbines were added across Germany[0], the lowest rate for 19 years . If German government policies are supposed to encourage the creation of new renewable energy production then they don't appear to be working particularly well. [0] https://www.spiegel.de/wirtsch…

As the article stresses since 2017 and for two reasons ( different from what is discussed in this thread): - Switching to an auction model in 2017 to drive prices down, which was implemented very poorly. - Strongly incentivizing small "citizen" project to increase acceptance in the population. Which messed up larger scale deployments and lead to awful bureaucracy.

> Strongly incentivizing small "citizen" project [...]

Doesn't Germany have restrictive distance regulations between wind turbines and residential areas?

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#322

Post by lispm » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 12:29 PM UTC

luckylion wrote: post #317

lispm wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Creating more renewable energy is pointless unless it reduces/replaces the use of fossil fuels. It does. > The point the article is making is that because of the way the renewable industry is being funded (from taxes on electricity consumption), consumers are opting to continue burning fossil fuels rather then use electricity. No, it doesn't. Renewable energy has a systematic preference and its share in electricity…

> This is not what is happening. The goal is to have more than 85% reneable energy for electricity production in 2050. I believe the point was that, because of the subsidies that are included in the price for electricity, that electricity isn't used for what it could be because it's more expensive than fossil-fuel options. Even if there was 100% renewable energy for electricity production in 2050, that wouldn't help…

There is not really a separate price for fossil fuel electricity. And renewable energy has preference: if renewable energy is available, it will be used with preference.

> Even if there was 100% renewable energy for electricity production in 2050, that wouldn't help with emissions that stem from heating unless you'd also make people heat with electricity. And to do that, you'd need to lower the prices (or raise the prices of alternatives).

That's right. In a future with large electricity surplus it makes sense to switch to electricity for heating. To make that attractive new price models are needed.

Currently another goal is to increase heating efficiency and cheap heating prices would go against it. When we switch to electricity we want to make sure that the heating is max efficient. Different from France, where electricity for heating is cheap and is used very inefficiently.

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#323

Post by garaetjjte » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 12:42 PM UTC

systemtest wrote: post #276

jillesvangurp wrote: post #186

Interestingly, most of Finland heats with electricity. I used to live there before I moved to Germany. Unlike Germany, Finland does not use a lot of natural gas. So, Germans subsidizing Finnish heating with clean energy is not necessarily a bad deal for Finland. I'd say it's a better deal for the planet than Russia subsidizing gas usage in e.g. Belarus, which is currently negotiating a new deal for this with Russia (…

Phasing out gas heating is going to be a very, very big job in the Netherlands. Replacing an energy source is easy, just place a nuclear power plant / solar field down and phase out the coal power station. Done. However, almost all homes in the Netherlands are heated by gas directly from the source. The gas is used to heat up water in the home and pump it through radiators on the wall or in the floor. A highly effici…

>The downside to this is that instead of heating the home with 70 degrees water like we do now, it will only be around 50 degrees. You can't heat a home in the winter like that

Well you can, you just need bigger radiator surface area. Modern gas heating also runs no hotter than ~50°C because condensing boilers are more efficient.

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#324

Post by TwoHeadedBeast » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 12:54 PM UTC

anoncake wrote: post #107

derefr wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you can never reach 100% renewables. So you need a backup, which is either gas or coal. Why isn't nuclear the backup? "90% renewable, 10% nuclear" sounds politically-viable; it's still "moving away from nuclear."

No, a power source as insanely dangerous as nuclear is fortunately not politically viable at all here in the long term.

Nuclear is safer than any other power source we have.

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#325

Post by GuB-42 » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 12:57 PM UTC

lispm wrote: post #304

marcus_holmes wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Creating more renewable energy is pointless unless it reduces/replaces the use of fossil fuels. Having more energy than we need is useless, and there's an environmental footprint to even the greenest wind farm. The point the article is making is that because of the way the renewable industry is being funded (from taxes on electricity consumption), consumers are opting to continue burning fossil fuels rather then use…

> Creating more renewable energy is pointless unless it reduces/replaces the use of fossil fuels. It does. > The point the article is making is that because of the way the renewable industry is being funded (from taxes on electricity consumption), consumers are opting to continue burning fossil fuels rather then use electricity. No, it doesn't. Renewable energy has a systematic preference and its share in electricity…

> > Creating more renewable energy is pointless unless it reduces/replaces the use of fossil fuels.

> It does.

Not really. Maybe in the future but now, it mostly replaced nuclear.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e2/Electric...

EDIT: My data is a bit outdated, they did significantly reduce they reliance on hard coal. Lignite use (the worst kind of fossil fuel...) stayed about the same and they use more gas. But still, renewable mostly replaced nuclear.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Dx7ZW_OVAAAfAQu.jpg

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#326

Post by mft_ » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 12:57 PM UTC

csomar wrote: post #245

mft_ wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can see part of your point. The title is slightly awkwardly worded - maybe because the author of the article isn't a native English speaker? Instead, perhaps: 'Why won't Germans heat their homes with free electricity?' ...or maybe all of it be rephrased a little: 'Why won't Germans heat their homes with electricity, even when it is free?' (I think the second version best captures the two questions dealt with within…

But the electricity is not free? More like why do germans pay too much for free electricity.

Well, it is (wholesale) and it isn't (to the end user) - that's part of the point of the article, and the title is being dramatic to get the reader interested.

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#327

Post by systemtest » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 1:06 PM UTC

dgacmu wrote: post #300

systemtest wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Phasing out gas heating is going to be a very, very big job in the Netherlands. Replacing an energy source is easy, just place a nuclear power plant / solar field down and phase out the coal power station. Done. However, almost all homes in the Netherlands are heated by gas directly from the source. The gas is used to heat up water in the home and pump it through radiators on the wall or in the floor. A highly effici…

Heating with an electric heat pump is quite efficient in most environments. Electric resistance heat is inefficient.

That is correct, but a heat pump requires a big unit placed outside the home that makes noise. Given our lack of space, closely grouped homes and apartment buildings, that is a challenge. Also a heat pump is not able to heat the water to 70 degrees, which is why you need to isolate your home even more for it to work.

Electric resistance heat is inefficient but it's a plug-and-play replacement solution for gas heaters. You can directly replace it without any changes to the home other than needing an extra circuit breaker and wire pulled.

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#328

Post by anon4242 » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 1:08 PM UTC

lispm wrote: post #322

luckylion wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is not what is happening. The goal is to have more than 85% reneable energy for electricity production in 2050. I believe the point was that, because of the subsidies that are included in the price for electricity, that electricity isn't used for what it could be because it's more expensive than fossil-fuel options. Even if there was 100% renewable energy for electricity production in 2050, that wouldn't help…

There is not really a separate price for fossil fuel electricity. And renewable energy has preference: if renewable energy is available, it will be used with preference. > Even if there was 100% renewable energy for electricity production in 2050, that wouldn't help with emissions that stem from heating unless you'd also make people heat with electricity. And to do that, you'd need to lower the prices (or raise the p…

There are good energy efficient solutions to heating that use electricity. Here in Sweden the most common solution for new houses is the downhole heat exchanger [1]. If you want a cheaper initial investment an air heat pump can be used.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downhole_heat_exchanger

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#329

Post by systemtest » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 1:11 PM UTC

pr0nin wrote: post #318

systemtest wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Phasing out gas heating is going to be a very, very big job in the Netherlands. Replacing an energy source is easy, just place a nuclear power plant / solar field down and phase out the coal power station. Done. However, almost all homes in the Netherlands are heated by gas directly from the source. The gas is used to heat up water in the home and pump it through radiators on the wall or in the floor. A highly effici…

> You can't heat a home in the winter like that so you also need to isolate every home. Yes you do or just pay for inefficiency. I've spent 2 years in Netherlands moving from Ukraine. I was shocked how (some) Dutch people ignorant to save warmth of their houses and schools in winter. Only way to change that make it expensive. As it should be. It's apparent to me as Ukraine has turned away from Russia subsidised (chea…

In my case my total electric + gas bill is around €60. Around €30 of that is fixed cost, €30 is variable cost.

I could improve by having better insulation in the walls or better windows. But with our high labour cost that would be thousands of euro's() to bring the bill down to at most €45, if I could cut my energy bill in half, which is unlikely. It's not worth the investment.

() I had to replace drywall due to water damage, it was around €2000 for a section of five square meter. This was replacing the insulation, wall, redoing the stucco, repainting and reapplying the fixtures and wall trim. Luckily this was covered by insurance. I don't want to know what replacing the 180 square meters of drywall would cost.

Re: Why Germans won’t heat their homes even with free electricity?

#330

Post by lispm » Fri, Feb 21, 2020, 1:38 PM UTC

anon4242 wrote: post #328

lispm wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is not really a separate price for fossil fuel electricity. And renewable energy has preference: if renewable energy is available, it will be used with preference. > Even if there was 100% renewable energy for electricity production in 2050, that wouldn't help with emissions that stem from heating unless you'd also make people heat with electricity. And to do that, you'd need to lower the prices (or raise the p…

There are good energy efficient solutions to heating that use electricity. Here in Sweden the most common solution for new houses is the downhole heat exchanger [1]. If you want a cheaper initial investment an air heat pump can be used. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downhole_heat_exchanger

Sure, there are. But houses need to be insulated. Consumers need not waste energy by just using it -> for example don't open the window to cool down, instead of lowering the heating, etc. etc. Standards need to be defined for new houses. Also provide solutions for existing houses. Provide business models. To create that market and to make some impact means that we are talking about decades.