By Paul Homewood
RWE’s new lignite power station opened in Neurath in 2012
Germany’s dash for coal continues apace. Following on the opening of two new coal power stations in 2012, six more are due to open this year, with a combined capacity of 5800MW, enough to provide 7% of Germany’s electricity needs.
Including the plants coming on stream this year, there are 12 coal fired stations due to open by 2020. Along with the two opened last year in Neurath and Boxberg, they will be capable of supplying 19% of the country’s power.
In addition, 27 gas fired stations are due on line, which should contribute a further 17% of Germany’s total electricity generation. (Based on 2011 statistics, total generation was 575 TwH).
It is worth noting that none of these coal or gas plants will be built with Carbon Capture & Storage (CCS), which is a legal requirement for coal generators in the UK, despite the fact that the technology does not yet exist on a commercial scale.
The UK government is so desperate to get out of the corner it has boxed itself into, that it wants to hand out huge sums to subsidise the cost of developing CCS technology. According to their “Overarching National Policy Statement for Energy” (Page 31), they want to support the cost of four commercial scale CCS projects.
But since the report was written in 2011, nothing much has happened, other than the announcement of two preferred bidders for the £1bn programme. One of these, the White Rose project at Drax, won’t be submitting a planning application until next year, and a final government investment decision won’t be made until 2015.
In the meantime, UK energy policy is allowed to drift. No company would abandon a successful, proven and efficient method of operating, without an alternative, better way having already been thoroughly tried and tested. So why does the UK government think it knows better?
APPENDIX A
German Coal Fired Power Stations Due to Open By 2020
| Operator | Location | MW | Date Due | Status |
| Trianel | Lunen | 750 | 2013 | In Trial |
| EnBW | Karlsruhe | 874 | 2013 | In Construction |
| GDF | Wilhelmshaven | 800 | 2013 | In Construction |
| Steag | Duisberg | 725 | 2013 | In Construction |
| E.ON | Datteln | 1055 | 2013 | In Construction |
| RWE | Hamm | 1600 | 2013 | In Construction |
| Vattenfall | Hamburg | 1640 | 2014 | In Construction |
| GKM | Mannheim | 911 | 2015 | In Construction |
| MIBRAG | Profen | 660 | 2020 | A/W Approval |
| RWE | Niederaussem | 1100 | n/a | A/W Approval |
| GETEC | Buttel | 800 | n/a | A/W Approval |
| Dow | Stade | 840 | n/a | A/W Approval |
As supplied by BDEW, the German Energy Producers Association.
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Dilweed
So what if Germany is opening some new coal plants?
Agreed. I have no problem with that either. They are doing what is right for their country.
The UK needs to do the same.
dillweed –
saving for or got a pension? Then you probably own part of BP. And I’d be careful writing things like “wilfully” on a public blog – Chief Counsel’s tend not to like it and their bite is worse than their bark.
Germans have always been practical – they do not want to freeze! I guess the Brits want to keep a stiff upper lip.
In the past during tough times Sam Walton trotted Hillary Clinton out as a show pony for his ‘Buy American’ campaign. They would place big ‘Made in USA’ tags on product displays. Wal~Mart image repaired.
Then Sam trotted Hillary out to show pony for his ‘Green Campaign’ and the other campaign was left behind as manufacturing skeedaddled largely because of heavy environmental regulations and fines. Companies were cleaning up their act but was any of that appreciated? They continued to get heavy fines from aggressive environmental lawyers who rarely ever were satisfied with a warning.
Abundant Nat Gas is a bit of a game changer for now.
Less you forget though, the grandson Sam Rawlins Walton sits on the EDF board of director$$$$. So Wal~Mart will follow through on their latest proclamation or it will turn into another smokescreen fallacy?
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/walmart-to-boost-sourcing-of-us-products-by-50-billion-over-the-next-10-years-186934711.html
Ferdberple knows how the flow goes.
Coal dies a quick death in the USA, preferred, but they’ll settle for a slow one if they must.
Paul Homewood says (April 23, 9:19 am):
The UK needs to do the same.
Darn right we do, and urgently. So … how are the sales of ice skates in Hell going?
dillweed7 says:
April 23, 2013 at 8:50 am
“So what if Germany is opening some new coal plants? So what if they have more on the drawing board? So what? They are spearheading a transformational change in how energy is produced.”
Well, we have installed mountains of unreliable contraptions that sometimes produce electricity. If we’re lucky that’s when we need electricity, in all other cases we give it away to countries that have a need for it and pay us pennies on the Dollar for it.
“They’ve paid upfront costs that others would not.”
That is factually wrong; we are STILL paying for it, and the cost is growing exponentially year on year; 16bn EUR in 2011; 20bn EUR in 2012. Electricity prices are growing exponentially as well.
“Anthony Watts has seen fit use solar.”
He lives in an area with three times the yearly insolation of Germany, and an insane monopoly electricity provider.
” Not that Germany or solar itself need justification or approval from him. Something for anyone gleeful over Germany opening some new coal plants.”
Not that our parties need justification for it. As I never tire of explaining, ALL established parties here are Green, pro-EU, pro-Euro parties (could one say, therefore antidemocratic parties? I think one can say that; as the EU is not a democracy.)
So, look to Germany if you want to see the future! Watch us perish.
But; if you want to look even farther into the future, look at the Wind turbines of Portugal and Spain, at the solar panels of Spain and Italy and Greece, and at the societies around these contraptions, and ask them how happy they are now.
Because all of these countries had the same FIT’s or even higher ones as Germany.
Please also note, the warmist propaganda in Germany from all media and all established parties continues unabated, as warmism continues to be needed as the pretense for expropriating the population. Of course we also need reliable sources of electricity, so we build coal power plants as well, but the officially promoted doctrin stays warmism.
dillweed7 says:
April 23, 2013 at 8:53 am
What is the source for 3000 dying from energy poverty in the UK?
3000 is less than the extra deaths for last March _alone_ .
“Age UK’s Michelle Mitchell said: ‘We are trailing behind our European counterparts when it comes to providing decent housing that people can afford to heat.’
In total, there were 33,500 deaths over the first three weeks of last month, up from an average of 29,294 in recent years, the Office for National Statistics reported. Another 1,000 extra deaths are predicted for the final week of the month.”
http://metro.co.uk/2013/04/04/5000-lives-believed-to-have-been-lost-due-to-bitter-march-3584311/
“The figures reveal that while the appalling death toll of lambs has been widely reported, the death toll among pensioners has been far higher. The overall death toll in the first three weeks of March was 33,500, compared with a previous average of 29,294 in recent years.”
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/freezing-march-weather-linked-to-big-jump-in-death-rate-8559769.html
“Ed Davey, the energy secretary, repeated Government assurances that Britain is not running out of gas and warned energy companies on Tuesday that freezing conditions were “no excuse to push up bills” amid concerns over the ability of elderly people to keep warm. ”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/topics/weather/9955587/Deaths-rise-10pc-in-freezing-weather.html
“Every winter, thousands of older people in England become seriously ill or even die as a result of the cold.”
http://www.ageuk.org.uk/health-wellbeing/keeping-your-body-healthy/preventing-winter-deaths/
“Michelle Mitchell, Age UK’s Charity Director-General, said: ‘It’s really worrying that the number of deaths in March this year are significantly higher than the average for the previous five years.
‘Cold homes are particularly dangerous to the health of older people and are a major contributing factor to the high numbers of excess winter deaths in this country.
In total, there were 33,500 deaths over the first 3 weeks of March 2013, compared with an average of 29,294 over the last 5 years.”
http://www.sovereignindependentuk.co.uk/2013/04/12/5000-extra-deaths-during-march/
“The bitterly cold weather is killing more people in England as millions of pensioners and families lack the financial capability to heat their homes, media reports said.
According to reports, in the week ending March 15, 11,180 deaths were registered – 1,300 more than the average for the past five years – which included 9,500 pensioners. There were 11,245 deaths registered in the previous week, 1,265 more than usual.”
http://beforeitsnews.com/alternative/2013/03/cold-snap-adds-to-recession-woes-in-uk-2604338.html
“As the country was subjected to the worst March snowfall in over 30 years, official figures showed that there were more than 4,000 extra deaths in just five weeks as the wintry conditions persisted. ”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/topics/weather/9950731/Drawn-out-winter-may-have-caused-thousands-of-extra-deaths.html
It not all bad news – the PR man call me Dave knows when to step in with a suitable ‘life saving’ opportunity –
“David Cameron saves stricken SHEEP in daring rescue
DAVID Cameron has revealed he waded into a swamp to haul out a stranded ewe after a day of helping out a neighbour with lambing in his rural Oxfordshire constituency.”
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/388753/David-Cameron-saves-stricken-SHEEP-in-daring-rescue
If there is a logic to fear, clear immediate dangers might take precedence over vague future worries. Clear to them that is. I don’t know what anti-nuclear minds think, probably more about Chernobyl than Thorium.
http://energyfromthorium.com/thorium/
@ur momisugly dillweed7: You seem to really love “renewable” energy. Aside from making energy costs skyrocket, harming struggling economies, and forcing many people into energy poverty, what else do you love about them?
Let’s have a sunshine hours fight. California V Germany. No comparison. By the way Germany just had its darkest winter. Ouch!
Of course, they have to be kept running for when the wind ain’t blowin’ and the sun don’t shine. Ouch!
dillweed7 says:
April 23, 2013 at 8:53 am
What is the source for 3000 dying from energy poverty in the UK?
Dilweed – just do an internet search for: march deaths cold UK
Multiple hits
And the number was 2000 extra in the first weeks of March alone. The total number dying is an order of magnitude greater.
I have responded with links but I think a reply with several URLs to MSM sites goes into the spam trap,
So, coal is better for the environment than nuclear…..Who knew?
Where is everybody?
No news articles about Greenpeace or Sierra Club chaining themselves to the coal fired turbine steam generators?
Where’s ole Jimmy Hansen. I thought he was pro nuke?
Shouldn’t he be lying on the tracks of the trains of death to prevent movement of the devil’s heat source?
These people and their organizations are so obvious.
Follow the money.
cn
Total NUKE FEAR . . closing nukes buying power from France [nukes?] what a failure was the
Total NUKE FEAR . . closing nukes buying power from France [nukes?] what a failure was the E=GREEN alternative power program was = they used Nuke to subsidize green . . now they need cheap power to keep their industrial base.
When the UK governments own chief scientific adviser bleats on about the dangers of global warming then it has a difficulty rationalising its policy.
Readers to this site need to understand, if they don’t already, that British politicians are in general scientifically illiterate. This wilful ignorance by most of those attracted to national politics has deep roots and is unlikely to change anytime soon. What is even more regrettable is the complacent smugness of much of the population, they will learn, as we have done so in the past, that there are hard lessons to be absorbed from idle indifference to what is done in our name. Alas the immediate prospects remain poor as Messers Cameron, Clegg and Milliband all lack the sense they were born with.
This is great. I often have believers hold up Germany as an example of a suscessful implementation of green engergy. Turns out it didn’t work out too well over there. Yet another argument has swung over to our side.
dillweed7 says:
April 23, 2013 at 8:53 am
“What is the source for 3000 dying from energy poverty in the UK?”
Not too complicated a thing there dill, you can use GOOGLE…..
“Since 2000, excess winter deaths in England and Wales remained generally at around 25,000. For the period of 2007-2008 the number of excess winter deaths was 27,480 of which the Hill reporte estimated that around 10% were caused directly by fuel poverty.[6] The winter of 2008-2009 the coldest in 10 years, and the Office for National Statistics estimated there were a total of 36,700, an increase of 49% over the previous year, which represents a 23.8% rise in deaths during the winter.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_poverty_in_the_United_Kingdom
and here:
http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/vsob2/monthly-figures-on-deaths-registered-by-area-of-usual-residence–england-and-wales/march-2013–provisional-/index.html
[Note: “dillweed” is persona non grata (PNG) here. Apologies to Anthony for mistakenly approving his last 2 comments. He hasn’t been around for a while, but that’s no excuse for a highly paid moderator on the Big Oil payroll. ~ mod.]
The trouble with wind power is that it is 14th century technology – however gussied up and prettyfied it is today. And 14th century technology is going to give you a 14th century standard of living.
“He hasn’t been around for a while, but that’s no excuse for a highly paid moderator on the Big Oil payroll. ~ mod.]”
Ah-HA! I KNEW it! The cat’s out of the bag now…
Dilweed7? Surely there can’t be six others?
The warmists have been touting Germany’s wind and solar for years. The chickens are coming home to roost!
Rhoda R:
At April 23, 2013 at 11:19 am you say
You make a good point. Indeed, it is better than you say.
Windpower was developed over thousands of years (not merely centuries) and was abandoned when the greater energy intensity available from fossil fuels became available by use of the steam engine.
Wind energy powered most of the world’s shipping for thousands of years. Primitive wind turbines powered pumps (notably in the Netherlands and England) and mills throughout Europe for centuries.
There are a number of types of wind turbines. They are divided into Vertical-Axis and Horizontal-Axis types.
Vertical-axis windmills to mill corn were first developed by the Persians around 1500 BC, and they were still in use in the 1970’s in the Zahedan region. Sails were mounted on a boom attached to a shaft that turned vertically. The technology had spread to Northern Africa and Spain by 500 BC. Low-speed, vertical-axis windmills are still popular in Finland because they operate without adjustment when the direction of the wind changes. These inefficient Finnish wind turbines are usually made from a 200 litre oil drum split in half and are used to pump water and to aerate land. Low speed vertical-axis windmills for water pumping and air compressing are commercially available (a selection of commercial suppliers is at http://energy.sourceguides.com/businesses/byP/water/wPumpMills/wPumpMills.shtml) .
The horizontal-axis wind turbine was invented in Egypt and Greece around 300 BC. It had 8 to 10 wooden beams rigged with sails, and a rotor which turned perpendicular to the wind direction. This type of wind turbine later became popular in Portugal and Greece. Around 1200 AD, the crusaders built and developed the post-mill for milling grain. The turbine was mounted on a vertical post and could be rotated on top the post to keep the turbine facing the wind. This post-mill technology was first adopted for electricity generation in Denmark in the late 1800’s. The technology soon spread to the U.S. where it was used to pump water and to irrigate crops across the Great Plains. During World War I, some American farmers rigged wind turbines to each generate 1 kW of DC current. Such wind turbines were mounted on buildings and towers. On western farms and railroad stations, wind turbines for pumping water were between 6 and 16m high and had 2 to 3m diameter. With 15kmh wind speed, a 2m-diameter turbine operating a 60cm diameter pump cylinder could lift 200 litres of water per hour to a height of 12m. A 4m diameter turbine could lift 250 litres per hour to a height of 38m.
The above brief history demonstrates that wind turbines can have useful niches to the present day. For example, small wind turbines can be used to economically pump water or generate electricity in remote locations distant to – or disconnected from (e.g. on boats) – an electricity grid supply. But wind power lost favour when the greater energy concentration in fossil fuels became widely available by use of steam engines. Wind power has recently found favour for large scale electricity generation in some places, but such use is uneconomic and impractical.
Today, if wind power were economically competitive with fossil fuels, then oil tankers would be sailing ships. Japan has conducted several studies to ascertain if use of automated sails could assist modern shipping. These studies have demonstrated that available wind power is so small a contribution to the powering of a ship that the systems to obtain it cannot recover their capital.
However, since the 1970s, the use of large, modern wind turbines has become popular for electricity generation in some places. This is especially true in Denmark, Germany, the UK and also in parts of the USA. Reasons for this use are entirely political. The low energy concentration in wind requires use of very many turbines with associated very high capital and maintenance costs. Also, the output of the turbines depends on the weather and, therefore, cannot be predicted with accuracy for more than – at most – a few days in advance.
Windfarms are local assemblies of wind turbines for power generation. Their turbines generate electricity when the wind is strong enough but not too strong. This makes their output intermittent, and electricity is not a commodity so it cannot be stored in significant amounts and must be used at its existing distribution system when generated. This intermittent supply of electricity disrupts the electricity grid and prevents the windfarms reducing need for power stations which are needed to provide power when windfarms don’t.
I am astonished when windpower supporters say windpower requires subsidies because it is “new technology”. Windpower was abandoned when the greater energy intensity available from fossil fuels became available by use of the steam engine.
So, if windpower is new technology then the steam engine must be future-tech.
Richard
Stunned at this news,why then in the UK are we having to shut down coal fire power stations under E.U directives whilst Germany is allowed to build new ones?????