While Germany likes to fancy itself as being among the “global leaders” in tackling climate change by expanding green energies, the country has in fact taken very little action recently to back up the appearances.
If anything, Germany is more in the green energy retreat mode. There are good reasons for this.
German flagship business daily “Handelsblatt” reported here yesterday how Germany’s wind energy market is now “threatening to implode” and as a result “thousands of jobs are at risk“.
José Luis Blanco, CEO of German wind energy giant Nordex, blames the market chaos on “policymakers changing the rules“. Subsidies have been getting cut back substantially.
The problem, Blanco says, is that worldwide green energy subsidies are being capped and wind parks as a result are no longer looking profitable to investors. The Handelsblatt writes that “things have never been this bad“.
50% drop in new German parks
The online Hasepost here reports that while in 2016 some 4600 megawatts of new German wind power capacity were installed onshore, the figure will fall almost 50% to 2450 megawatts of new power by 2019. The fall could even be greater.
Blanco told Handelsblatt:
In the next two years we will see a substantial collapse in the installation of new wind parks in Germany – we will have to react to this.“
Recently Germany moved to scale back subsidies for new wind parks because the power transmission grid has not kept par with the rapid wind park installation, and as a result the grid has become riddled with inefficiencies and has become increasingly prone to grid collapses from unstable power feed in. Also consumer electricity prices had been skyrocketing.
Citizens groups increasing their protests.
There has also been growing protests against wind parks by citizens groups. Angela Merkel’s campaign stops are increasingly being met in part by wind energy protesters. Yesterday in Brandenburg Merkel was met again by wind energy protesters, who however were over-shadowed by a raucous 1500-strong crowd of right-wing protesters shouting “Merkel must go!”
Despite the loud protests, Merkel’s party remains poised to win the coming late-September national election handily, as she and her party lead the rival SPD socialist party, led by Martin Schulz, by double digits.
Wind energy, once greeted with open-arms a decade ago, is now increasingly unwelcome and getting the door slammed in its face.
Comeback coal
Yesterday at the East German Energy Forum in Leipzig, both the centrist CDU and the SPD socialists were in agreement: brown coal (lignite) must remain a part of Germany’s energy mix, the online Lausitzer Rundschau writes. Speaking before 400 industry representatives, Brandenburg’s Minister President Dietmar Woidke (SPD) complained that green energies are foremost “unreliable energy sources“.
“More realism”
Saxony Anhalt Minister President Reiner Haseloff (CDU) called for more realism, saying that “brown coal belonged to east Germany until 2050″.
Saxony Minister President Stanislaw Tillich (CDU) called the European Commissions limit values for CO2 emissions “as going beyond the technical possibilities“.
What does this all tell us? Despite all the hype over green energies in Germany, the general sentiment and movement in the country show a very different picture.
The 2016 “EEG Novelle” (link) defined this smaller corridor for new wind power. Shouldn’t be too surprising for those wanting to build wind farms in Germany.
Onshore: “In den Jahren 2017, 2018 und 2019 werden jeweils 2.800 MW und ab 2020
2.900 MW pro Jahr (brutto) ausgeschrieben.”
Offshore: “In den Jahren 2021 und 2022 ist ein Zubau von 500 MW pro Jahr und in
2023 bis 2025 von 700 MW pro Jahr vorgesehen.”
That presentation is more than one year old, seb. Looks like they got their numbers wrong. Nordex has a different view TODAY. You can always Google up opposing figures – helps to check the quality and up-to-dateness though.
The one I linked to is about the last “EEG Novelle” … the current one if you will.
What is the different view you are talking about? And why would the quality of the numbers in a law be lacking and not be up to date?
And I thought wind power was so competitive it didn’t need subsidies any more 😉
It doesn’t need many subsidies anymore, but even if it didn’t need them at all you can’t just build wind farms and connect them to the grid. There is only a certain amount of MWs that the government is inviting tenders for. The lowest bidders win in each “auction” and get to build their wind farms.
If the subsidies would be stopped, no farm will ever be build.
And what’s more: the government guarantees that money always flows to the wind farm, even when they are standing still.
They get paid. That’s a subsidy.
That money comes from the consumers via taxes. So the consumers pay at least twice for the same power. That’s robbery.
But hey, that is left wing policy.
Are you familiar with a new power plant called Hinkley Point C? Is a guaranteed minimum price of 90 pounds per MWh from there a subsidy in your opinion? Is that twice or triple the normal electricity price?
That’s probably true for today’s market. The trend is clearly going towards very cheap wind and solar power. I don’t know why you guys keep thinking that the prices of today are all that can be achieved. Just look back 5, 10 or 15 years and compare those prices with today. We’ve come a long way and it’s not the end.
Hinkley Point Is just confirmation that the UK government is just as stupid as the German government.
However, more of the UK population have seen through the scam than have the Germans and we will all come to our senses after we have left the suffocating unelected dictators of the EUSSR.
Nuclear provides baseload power, without which the grid would become unstable. It’s a cost that must be borne by consumers.
But wind energy provides the opposite of baseload power. So it should not need a subsidy. Afterall it’s inputs are zero.
“That’s probably true for today’s market. The trend is clearly going towards very cheap wind and solar power.” – Chatbot_SebH
Which is why electricity prices for consumers in areas supplied by wind keep skyrocketing.
https://stopthesethings.com/2017/08/16/politics-of-power-queensland-voters-blame-subsidised-renewables-for-rocketing-power-prices/
SebH just keeps parroting the same nonsense, no matter how often we make corrections.
For comparison, here’s an article with values for some of those countries about 2 years ago.
http://euanmearns.com/green-mythology-and-the-high-price-of-european-electricity/
Not going to be reliable or affordable, ever.
Meanwhile, the inability of the poor to actually pay for energy in Germany continues to swell. Ah, the wonders of wind.
https://www.thelocal.de/20170302/over-300000-poverty-hit-german-homes-have-power-cut-off-each-year
Each year between 2011 and 2015, electricity providers cut off power to at least 300,000 German households who could no longer afford to pay their bills…between 15.7 percent and 16.7 percent of people in Germany are threatened with poverty.
“Energy poverty in Germany is a silent catastrophe for millions of people, especially in the cold, dark winter months,” said Eva Bulling-Schröter, energy spokeswoman for Die Linke.
https://energytransition.org/2016/08/comparing-energy-poverty-in-germany-with-other-countries/
If you thought this is a special German problem that only countries with high electricity prices have …
Also, do you know what energy poverty means? It doesn’t mean that you are unable to pay the monthly bills, but you knew that, right?
So fighting this problem is the same as fighting poverty in general. Making consumables cheaper for the poor is one solution, the other one is getting them out of poverty. Do you agree or disagree?
SebastianH, you’ve previously stated that there is no “energy poverty” in Germany because “heating is paid for when you live on wellfare” (your exact words/spelling).
–
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/bj-rn-lomborg-says-that-the-prevailing-solution-to-global-warming-is-hurting-the-poor-more-than-the-problem-is
“In Germany, where green subsidies will cost €23.6 billion this year, household electricity prices have increased by 80% since 2000, causing 6.9 million households to live in energy poverty. Wealthy homeowners in Bavaria can feel good about their inefficient solar panels, receiving lavish subsidies essentially paid by poor tenants in the Ruhr, who cannot afford their own solar panels but still have to pay higher electricity costs.”
–
Who cares, right? Wind power is reducing Germany’s CO2 emissions (well, maybe not) and thus keeping Greenland from melting further so that we don’t have to experience the catastrophe of 0.39 of a centimeter of sea level rise from the Greenland Ice Sheet over the next 20 years. That’s a fair trade: millions more in energy poverty in Germany for the sake of perhaps preventing more catastrophic ice sheet melt contribution to sea level rise.
Yes, such answers happen when you or the authors of your linked articles confuse poverty and energy poverty (paying more than 10% of their income for energy) and use both terms as if they were equivalent. Obviously being in energy poverty doesn’t mean that you are poor enough to be in a welfare program.
Half of which is caused by inflation.
Ah and it’s not the increase in oil prices, etc? And did we really have zero people living in energy poverty prior to 2000?
I care about solving the problem of poverty. The problem is not higher energy prices, it is that some households have low enough incomes that they need to spend 10% or more of their income on energy. Increasing the incomes should be the priority here.
“Increasing the incomes should be the priority here.”
Reducing prices/taxes is the solution.
THEY OTTA PASS A LAW?
Everything they know is wrong.
http://blog.independent.org/2017/08/28/a-plea-for-do-nothing-government/
There is no law that can make life fair. Only by creating the conditions for a free and prosperous environment, that affords ample opportunities by it’s very nature, will optimize everyone’s chances. Step back and let people be creative, and only interfere to punish parasites, not reward them. All top down imposed “solutions” will fail. They always have, and always will.
And of course Kenneth there are still birds and bats flying which is quite intolerable for all Greens, so these bird and bat killers must be subsidized till all are vanquished.
I guess that would suffice for them in lieu of getting CO2 low enough to kill enough vegetation to deplete the atmosphere of oxygen, thereby solving the ultimate problem of how to exterminate all animal life on earth.
Are you an anti-cat person too?
Yes, yonason
Good point.
I never cease to be amazed how a supposedly “competive” industry is so reliant on subsidies.
Hey SebastianH – if windmills are really competitive let’s remove all subsidies from all electricity generation and see what methods survive.
I’m betting it is not wind, or solar.
I am all for it. Let the consumer see the true costs of every form of electricity generation and let them pay for all the costs via their electricity bills. You would be surprised 😉
If you mean just the direct monetary subsidies, there are already a few offshore wind parks planned to go online in the 2020s that don’t take subsidies.
Fossil fuels (stored sunlight) may be subsidised in a few countries, but it is not in Europe.
And don’t try telling me that tax rebates are the same as subsidies- they are not.
Global fossil fuel subsidies.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X16304867
Or in a more reader friendly article here: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2017/aug/07/fossil-fuel-subsidies-are-a-staggering-5-tn-per-year
Chatbots sure do love their lies…
http://euanmearns.com/green-mythology-and-the-high-price-of-european-electricity/
See also here
http://cornerstonemag.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/US-Energy-Subsidies_Fig-3.jpg
…and here…
http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/The-Great-Fossil-Fuel-Subsidy-Myth.html
…and here…
http://euanmearns.com/the-appalling-truth-about-energy-subsidies/
…contributing virtually nothing to society. Just like chatbots everywhere.
GONE WITH THE WIND?
…or, The Drought That Can’t Come Soon Enough.
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/07/19/delingpole-renewmaggedon-solar-wind-industries-dying-as-subsidies-dry-up/
Why is it that chatbots are so free with other peoples’ money?
https://www.thenewamerican.com/tech/environment/item/22402-top-scientist-un-climate-finance-is-subsidy-for-kleptocracy
More debunking of chatbot disinformation.
Please also see my other post on this, when it comes out of moderation
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/09/government-burn-70-billion-a-year-subsidizing-renewables-and-wild-claims-of-fossil-fuel-subsidies-debunked/
“…the biggest subsidizers of fossil fuels are not the USA, or indeed, not any of the wealthy west (which is where the renewable subsidies thrive).”
It’s kind of funny that you link to breitbart.com stories and reacted like you did when confronted with a skepticalscience.com link. It must be interesting to live with those double standards 😉
Anyway, the USA isn’t the biggest subsidizer of fossil fuels. How does that change the multi-trillion dollar amount of subsidies in that sector?
https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/wp/2015/wp15105.pdf
And just to be clear: I am not saying that subsidies for renewables are ok because fossil fuels get subsidized too. I am just saying that the skeptic’s self-illusion of fossil fuels receiving no subsidies is incorrect.
” I am just saying that the skeptic’s self-illusion of fossil fuels receiving no subsidies is incorrect.” – Chatbot_SebH
Another straw man. We don’t say they don’t receive subsidies, but what they get isn’t of the same kind, nor is it of the same magnitude.
Graphic comparing subsidies on a per unit basis
https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2016/10/energy-subsidies-chart.jpg
They are in no way comparable.
from here
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/10/12/the-truth-about-energy-subsidies-solar-gets-436-times-more-than-coal/
The commenter I replied to seems to think so.
And well … there is a difference between both subsidies. Fossil fuels should be competitive by now and yet they still are subsidized. Renewables were almost non-existent 10-15 years back and the subsidies for them are designed to make them competitive.
So the US is subsidizing solar with $0.231 per kWh? Impressive. The last invitation of tenders in Germany resulted in prices of 0.0566 € per kWh.
“Renewables were almost non-existent 10-15 years back and the subsidies for them are designed to make them competitive.” – SebH
Didn’t work.
As to America subsidizing more then Germany, maybe that’s because Germans pay so much more up front directly to the utility companies that the Govt doesn’t have to cough up as much?
https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Solar-Graph4.png
Solar and wind were stupid ideas from the beginning. Only getting stupider with time.
I see, so you don’t understand how the subsidies work in Germany. Thank you for making that clear.
It’s a long term project btw … declaring “didn’t work” after this short period is stupid.
No Germany, please keep shoveling the Euros at the unreliable energy! Please try harder, you are the example the rest of the world needs!
Just like the failed German funded solar power projects in North African deserts, the world only learns when well subsidized, virtue signaling, crony capitalist, glossy new ‘technology’ when it catastrophically fails.
So please keep it going so that the rest of the world can learn.
Problem is, tom0mason, that Australia had a chance to learn, and blew it big time.
https://stopthesethings.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/sa-highest-power-costs-table.png
It’s like they’re in a competition to see who can get their country to self-destruct first.
Yes makes you wonder what the main common features are between these two nations. Would that be large Green Party and very bias media do you think?
Seems like a good bet.
[…] US. Well it won't be under Trump and it won't be with your beloved wind farm according to this. German Wind Energy Market “Threatening To Implode”…”Things Have Never Been T… Sign in or Register Now to […]
”Things Have Never Been This Bad”! – From Article Title
If it’s anything like the situation in the UK, it’s only going to get worse.
https://stopthesethings.com/2017/08/18/government-mandated-theft-the-great-scottish-wind-power-racket-unwrapped/
Oh, yeah, that’s gonna save the planet. Umhm. For Sure.
It’s truly sickening to think about how opportunist carpetbaggers like Vesta have earned billions of dollars on poor people through ideologically driven subsidies given to something as useless, environmentally destructive and expensive as stupid wind mills.
According to the IEA, Germany’s actual production of electricity from wind *fell* by 12% last year:
2015: 88.0 TWh
2016: 77.4 TWh
This is despite installing many more gigawatts of nameplate capacity.
OECD Electricity from wind also surged from 5.3% to 5.5% in the same period.
It certainly looks like this experiment is hitting a wall….
Source: Comparison of IEA Renewables Information/Trend reports for 2016 and 2017 (detailed by source sections, both on page 10)
[…] Notrickszone: German Wind Energy Market “Threatening To Implode ….. […]
[…] German Wind Energy Market “Threatening To Implode”…”Things Have Never Been T… […]
[…] ότι έχει αναφερθεί και σε άλλες ιστοσελίδες, πχ στο NoTricksZone και […]