Can't wait for the 150 smug comments saying "But they shut down nuclear power".
Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
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Re: Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
#222Actually Germany recently shut down all of it's nuclear plants and replaced them with the dirtiest fuel possible: lignite coal burning plants. Statistics are a peculiar thing.
This is why Germany produces almost 10 times as much CO2 per kWh as France. https://abload.de/img/img_20230705_133511_84efdp.jpg It's mind boggling.
This seems to assume that nuclear disposal is something clean.
Re: Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
#223Earlier quoted context omitted.
The issue in Germany is that this transition is expensive, even more so after 16 years of decay of everything from the past coalitions. And that makes the current coalition unpopular, along with an eternaly bickering liberals(in nothing but name) trying to block any spending. Add onto that Conservative tabloids continously firing against green with every scrap they can get, and we're looking at fascists polling over…
This is the new political landscape in Europe. By including the fascists, the conservatives roughly double their votes and don't need to compromise with the rest anymore. We're seeing this now in Finland and probably next in Germany. To me this is selfish and short-sighted in the short term, and outright dangerous in the long term.
There's even historical precedent in Germany, but in their greed I fear they'll repeat the same mistakes from 100 years ago.
Re: Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
#224Germany also produced a multi year net electricity generation low in June. The rise mostly results from this reduction because of the nuclear phase out. These are not the actual numbers but an example: June 2022: renewables 15TWh, total 40TWh = 37.5% June 2023: renewables 15TWh, total 30TWh = 50%
Destatis claims the reason is that demand was measurably lower than 2022: https://www.destatis.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/2023/06...
yeah, maybe companies moved their production elsewhere
Re: Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
#225Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is it that more expensive if you take into account all the externalities from burning coal? Increased cancer risk due to high radiation, other pollution etc. CO2 is just the cherry on top.. > That would imply that Germany should be criticized more than the US, but this cannot be. This is tangential and there is also no need to resort to whataboutism for no reason.
There's no whataboutism, I wasn't saying Germany might be bad, but look at someone else. I'm asking a question about the logical conclusion of what you're saying: the most important thing is to keep nuclear plants alive before coal is removed. Sure, but it can't be right. Many countries are doing that, e.g. the US, and failing to decarbonize as quickly as Germany. So it's illogical and irrational. Furthermore there c…
> Sure, but it can't be right.
I don’t follow. I mean you might be right. But using US as an example hardly make sense because they didn’t really try to ‘decarbonize’ that hard..
> because Germany is a leader in fossil fuel reduction this century
Germany was emitting ~500 grams per kWh back in 2000 and 385 in 2022. That not that spectator at all considering they weren’t at all trying to change this until the mid 2010s.
EU wide CO2 emissions have continuously decreased from around 520 grams to less than 250 in the same period.
So not only Germany wasn’t a leader throughout 90%+ of this century, they it was much worse than average…
Re: Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
#226Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, targeting individual transport with inefficient public transport and bicycles while restarting abandoned coal power plants and abandoning running nuclear power plants is going to work wonderfully indeed.
public transport can be efficient if done correctly and funded accordingly (Japan, Switzerland)
I'd like to add Singapore because they buy their excellent MRT trains from Germany.
Re: Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
#227Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is why Germany produces almost 10 times as much CO2 per kWh as France. https://abload.de/img/img_20230705_133511_84efdp.jpg It's mind boggling.
At the same time France had to buy loads of electricity from Germany in the last year because several nuclear plants had to shut down due to a) maintenance problems and b) low rivers that could not provide sufficient cooling.
Ironically, I hear the ones that were shut down in Germany were some of the best maintained in the world and had very high "capacity factors" even when compared with other nuclear (fraction of time delivering power to the grid). It seems like the solution to poor maintenance is better maintenance? Some of the causes of recent poor French maintenance are analyzed here: https://player.fm/series/decouple/somethings-rotten-with-fre...
I assume you wouldn't seriously argue that rivers are the limiting factor to deployment of nuclear energy.
Re: Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
#228Living in Germany is leaving any big city and seeing loads of wind turbines everywhere. I know very little of its economics, like that it typically takes 7 years to pay it back and lasts 20-25 years, but looks like a good way to generate renewable energy and will likely soon take Germany to 100%. It's a goal for the government and for many years it has been pushing forward. I dislike many things here, but I can't say…
The US does invest in it, almost all new capacity added is renewables, has been for several years now, and this will not change unless something happens. The fastest grower is Texas of all places simply because it's really cheap. Birds are not an environmental issue, it was just a made up talking point that was debunked. Windows and cars are responsible for an order of magnitude more bird deaths.
> Birds are not an environmental issue, it was just a made up talking point that was debunked. Windows and cars are responsible for an order of magnitude more bird deaths.
Can you share the reference? Thank you
Re: Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
#229Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or you can build solar and wind, which is what Germany is doing to replace coal. Successfully. Don't really see your point.
Solar and wind alone can’t provide 100%. Not yet anyway.. > Successfully Yet the amount of energy generated by burning coal has only increased. * https://www.destatis.de/EN/Themes/Economic-Sectors-Enterpris...
The data on that link says:
2019: 114.0 + 57.4
2020: 91.7 + 42.8
2021: 110.1 + 54.6
2022: 116.2 + 64.4
When the first wave of decomissions came in 2011, the number was
2011: 150 + 112 [1]
Straight question, to see if you can answer it: is it going up or down? Furthermore, even in the data you are posting, it's going down every year except last. And it went up last year because France's nuclear energy failed and needed to be supported [2].
About 100%: perhaps, but the proof is in the pudding. Historically, the naysayers have been incorrect for decades. Here [3], an advertisement from the German nuclear lobby from the 90s, that makes a case for young people: don't be against nuclear, we need it, renewables can NEVER account for more than 4% of our total production.
Fortunately nobody listened to them.
[1] https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/156695/umfrag...
[2] https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/even-crisis-germany-...
Re: Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
#230Earlier quoted context omitted.
At the same time France had to buy loads of electricity from Germany in the last year because several nuclear plants had to shut down due to a) maintenance problems and b) low rivers that could not provide sufficient cooling.
Ironically, I hear the ones that were shut down in Germany were some of the best maintained in the world and had very high "capacity factors" even when compared with other nuclear (fraction of time delivering power to the grid). It seems like the solution to poor maintenance is better maintenance? Some of the causes of recent poor French maintenance are analyzed here: https://player.fm/series/decouple/somethings-rott…
It's not that ironic.
Germans tend to do stuff right when they do it.
The ironic thing to me is that Germany is so anti-nuclear.