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Germany's Energy Catastrophe

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Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#101

Post by dispat0r »

locallost wrote: post #6

Germany proceeded with their "nuclear exit" in 2011. Had they gone the other way and all in on nuclear, they would be in the same situation as they are today as planning and building nuclear plants takes a lot longer than 10 years. Actually they would be way worse because instead of having 50% of electricity coming from renewables, they would still have 45% of it coming from coal, instead of 25% in 2020 (did not chec…

You are right, Germany should have build new nuclear plants in 2000. The renewables make the German energy grid unstable and expensive, we have the highest power cost in the world currently with no end in sight, also no storage for the renewables. You can build nuclear power plants in about 10 Years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barakah_nuclear_power_plant Uranium is not only exported by Russia.

Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#102

Post by disgu »

mvgcf wrote: post #10

This op-ed is getting things so utterly wrong, I don‘t even know where to start. The Energiewende (so cool he can make use of a german word, so much credibility) here in Germany is working just fine. It is a reasonable investment in our future. The reason natural gas is a problem right now is not that we have insufficient energy. The lack of gas is problematic because it is a preliminary product used in chemical proc…

> On sustainable energy sources: I, as many other germans, receive all of my electricity from purely renewable energy sources for more than ten years now. 24/7.

No you don't. Just because you pay for Ökostrom or whatever doesn't mean that the electricity you actually use was produced by renewables. It's one grid. You use the electricity produced by coal plants just like everyone else.

Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#103

Post by dividedbyzero »

ajuc wrote: post #65
planb wrote: post #25

We don’t have an energy problem. We have a gas problem. I’m open for (re-)discussing nuclear energy here in Germany, but we could run 100% on nuclear or coal and a full gas stop by Russia would still have catastrophic consequences. We need gas for industrial/chemical processes and heating our homes. In fact, if the Energiewende had progressed a bit further, then more houses would have installed a heat pump by now.

You have foreign policy blindness problem, no independent media problem and most of all - "everything except making cars and exporting them doesn't matter" problem. Otherwise I can't explain how you were so dumb for 3 decades. It's not like Germany is so poor it can't afford to pay 50% more for gas. Or that it couldn't build an LNG terminal just in case. Poland which is much less wealthy - managed to do it. How come…

Germany is very, very corrupt and extremely risk-averse at the higher levels of politics. Russia is very good at buying and enabling the right people to further their interests (point in case: ex-Chancellor Gerhard Schröder). That's pretty much all there really is to that. It's one of those cases where the root really is malicious intent, not stupidity.

Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#104

Post by dispat0r »

sexy_panda wrote: post #89
epups wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nuclear energy is just cheap because it gets massively funded by the state. No it doesn't. Not anymore than gas, coal and renewables at least. The issue of disposal is also simply incorrect. There are plenty of places to store it, France does it, everyone does it. Do you know where the waste from coal goes? Into the atmosphere, where it kills thousands directly and potentially billions indirectly with global warmin…

> The issue of disposal is also simply incorrect. There are plenty of places to store it. The question is not, whether there are places or not. It doesn't matter if none of the 16 regions in Germany wants to be responsible to store the waste. If no one wants to deal with it, the effect is the same.

Germany already has nuclear waste, we have to deal with it one way or another. I think permanent storage is a bad solution, most of the energy is still in there and further utilization will also reduce the danger of the waste.

Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#105

Post by dividedbyzero »

epups wrote: post #100
dividedbyzero wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And now the fourth largest economy in the world with a huge and extremely capable engineering base is committed to finding a way. Given that storage and other supporting tech for renewables has so far received hardly any serious funding at all, I think it's quite realistic to expect a success story there. Just consider what the many billions invested into fracking tech did to the US accessible gas reserves, and that…

Sure, I support that. But one thing doesn't preclude the other. Invest in nuclear now to get rid of coal, and at the same time invest in research that may or may not pay off.

Olkiluoto is bound to be 13 years late at four times the budget, the other ones in France and the UK look like they're going the same way, and Germany demonstrably sucks at these large-scale projects (think BER airport), so any new reactors probably wouldn't be ready before the 2040s, but they would be ridiculously expensive. That kind of money buys a lot of storage research and solar capacity.

Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#106

Post by BurningPenguin »

ajuc wrote: post #23

The funniest thing is - Germany was repeatedly warned by Eastern European states that this (literally this) will happen if they continue to build Nord Stream 1 and then Nord Stream 2 and try to "fix" Russia by trade. Russian government already poisoned Ukrainian presidential candidate in 2004. Killed opposition and journalists both in Russia and in EU. Invaded 2 countries (Chechnia and Georgia - I don't even count Li…

> Like how dumb can you be?

Well, several of those countries are using Russian designed nuclear reactors, where only Russian fuel is authorized to use. Why did they not change that in the last.. idk.. 30 years or so?

Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#107

Post by dispat0r »

throw827474737 wrote: post #56
mytailorisrich wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because they basically can't get them to work That's completely BS. More French reactors are off than usual because of delayed scheduled maintenance caused by Covid.

Yeah, that problem didn't even exist already pre pandemic, right? Btw, you believe you can maintain those plants forever?

No, you can't maintain them forever. The EDF is mismanaged, in Germany we never had this kind of problems with nuclear plants. South Korea also has an excellent track record with building new plants.

Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#108

Post by epups »

dividedbyzero wrote: post #105
epups wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, I support that. But one thing doesn't preclude the other. Invest in nuclear now to get rid of coal, and at the same time invest in research that may or may not pay off.

Olkiluoto is bound to be 13 years late at four times the budget, the other ones in France and the UK look like they're going the same way, and Germany demonstrably sucks at these large-scale projects (think BER airport), so any new reactors probably wouldn't be ready before the 2040s, but they would be ridiculously expensive. That kind of money buys a lot of storage research and solar capacity.

Ok, so since Germany is slow at building existing stuff, it will somehow be better at building non-existing, future tech stuff. Until then, gas and coal and we kill thousands.

Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#109

Post by epups »

sexy_panda wrote: post #89
epups wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nuclear energy is just cheap because it gets massively funded by the state. No it doesn't. Not anymore than gas, coal and renewables at least. The issue of disposal is also simply incorrect. There are plenty of places to store it, France does it, everyone does it. Do you know where the waste from coal goes? Into the atmosphere, where it kills thousands directly and potentially billions indirectly with global warmin…

> The issue of disposal is also simply incorrect. There are plenty of places to store it. The question is not, whether there are places or not. It doesn't matter if none of the 16 regions in Germany wants to be responsible to store the waste. If no one wants to deal with it, the effect is the same.

So it's impossible to resolve this issue? We cannot use our partners in the EU or abroad to help solve it? Well I guess we should just kill thousands with coal, and keep feeding the global warming furnace.

Re: Germany's Energy Catastrophe

#110

Post by BurningPenguin »

Yet another one, who thinks it's about electricity. We don't have much of a problem with that, since gas only makes up about 10% of the energy mix. About 75% of all households in Germany use gas and oil for heating. Your magic nuclear reactor won't change that. Switching those things takes some time, and it won't be done until next winter. All companies specialized in that are already booked out and there is a shortage on the necessary parts to build that stuff.
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