Power Grid Operators, Experts And Federal Audit Office Warn Of Blackouts As Coal, Nuclear Get Phased Out

Reposted from the NoTricksZone

By P Gosselin on 23. June 2021

As wildly fluctuating, weather-dependent green energies come increasingly online, German grid operators and the German Federal Audit Office are warning the German government of power blackouts. But the government is ignoring the warnings and continues to insist everything is fine.

Grid operator 50Hertz, for example, warns of energy shortages as Germany continues to shut down its nuclear and coal power plants, which currently serve to provide crucial baseload power for the grid.

Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi) refuses to heed the warnings and demands of the Federal Audit Office and the country’s grid operators, insisting: “All our studies show that, on the whole, we have sufficient power for Germany.”

“Momentous misjudgement”

But experts are calling BMWi’s stance “a technical and momentous misjudgement when it comes to power supply security, as will become apparent over the next few years,” reports the online Ruhrkultour here.

The President of the Austrian Society for Crisis Prevention, Herbert Saurugg, an expert for blackout and crisis prevention, says “the consequences of a blackout are being underestimated”.

“In Austria alone, this would mean damages of more than 1 billion euros in the first 24 hours. However, the danger of a sudden, supra-regional and prolonged power, infrastructure and supply failure affecting large parts of Europe is real. Help from outside is not to be expected.” reports the online Ruhrkultour here.

Power shortage warnings are mounting, “no Plan B”

The risk of blackouts are rising due to the unstable supply of growing wind and solar energy. The online Avantour reports:

Warnings of a massive power shortage are mounting. Three nuclear power plants are to be shut down at the end of the year, as are coal-fired power plants. Wind turbines and photovoltaic systems only supply electricity when the wind blows and the sun shines. There is no plan B to which energy policy can fall back.”

Germany will lose 50 GW of stable power

Experts have calculated that the phase-out of nuclear energy and coal-fired power generation means Germany will lose more than 50 gigawatts (GW) of stable power production capacity. Supply stability must be given higher priority, experts say.

Warnings of “considerable consequences”

Citing business daily Handelsblatt, “the energy industry warns of considerable consequences if the issue of secured capacity is not taken seriously.”

For power grid expert Herbert Saurugg, “the danger of a blackout is getting closer and closer if the government does not act,” reports Avantour .

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n.n
June 23, 2021 2:06 pm

Neither clean nor green, Green renewable blackouts… one step forward, two steps backward.

Gregory Woods
Reply to  n.n
June 23, 2021 2:09 pm

maybe ‘two steps backward’ into the abyss…

Bryan A
Reply to  Gregory Woods
June 23, 2021 2:35 pm

But the government is ignoring the warnings and continues to insist everything is fine

Sounds like Uberdenialist Supreme Griff and Denialist Sub-Komander Loydo are writing the German Government Propaganda these days

H.R.
Reply to  Bryan A
June 23, 2021 5:24 pm

I could almost swear that Loydo is actually Al Gore.

Has anyone ever seen the two of them in the same room at the same time?

At least we know Griff isn’t John Kerry posting under a pseudonym. Griff comes off as w-a-a-a-y more intelligent.

(Ok, OK… 😜)

John Endicott
Reply to  H.R.
June 24, 2021 9:03 am

I don’t know that I’d say griff comes off as more intelligent than Lurch, but he’s definitely more animated. Course that’s not saying much, a block of wood is more animated than Kerry.

Robert Arvanitis
June 23, 2021 2:18 pm

What happens when the statists discover “oxygen pollution?”
That word is from the Greek oxy ,”cutting acid” and genos “creating.”
if the oxygen is in too pure a form, it causes myopia, detachment of the retina, even blindness, MOST especially in newborns.
We must ban this deadly threat at once!

Zig Zag Wanderer
Reply to  Robert Arvanitis
June 23, 2021 2:45 pm

Can be extremely dangerous when combined with hydrogen too!

H.R.
Reply to  Zig Zag Wanderer
June 23, 2021 5:40 pm

It depends upon the ratio, but yeah…

Dihydrogen monoxide can be a potent greenhouse gas or deadly if ingested or inhaled in quantities above a certain level.

Somebody oughta doo sumpthin’!

Quit screwin’ around with CO2. We’re running a bit short of it right now and could use a little more.

Bryan A
Reply to  H.R.
June 23, 2021 6:57 pm

When statists discover Oxygen Pollution their Moronics will Oxidize

mikesmith
Reply to  H.R.
June 24, 2021 9:16 am

Here’s a website devoted to the dangers of DHMO. It is claimed that a town council in California once discovered this website and tried to ban this dangerous substance.
Ban Dihydrogen Monoxide! (lockhaven.edu)
https://www.lockhaven.edu/~dsimanek/dhmo.htm
Ban Dihydrogen Monoxide!The Invisible Killer

Dihydrogen monoxide is colorless, odorless, tasteless, and kills uncounted thousands of people every year. Most of these deaths are caused by accidental inhalation of DHMO, but the dangers of dihydrogen monoxide do not end there. Prolonged exposure to its solid form causes severe tissue damage. Symptoms of DHMO ingestion can include excessive sweating and urination, and possibly a bloated feeling, nausea, vomiting and body electrolyte imbalance. For those who have become dependent, DHMO withdrawal means certain death.

Dihydrogen monoxide:

  • is also known as hydroxyl acid, and is the major component of acid rain.
  • contributes to the “greenhouse effect.”
  • may cause severe burns.
  • contributes to the erosion of our natural landscape.
  • accelerates corrosion and rusting of many metals.
  • may cause electrical failures and decreased effectiveness of automobile brakes.
  • has been found in excised tumors of terminal cancer patients.

Contamination Is Reaching Epidemic Proportions!

Quantities of dihydrogen monoxide have been found in almost every stream, lake, and reservoir in America today. But the pollution is global, and the contaminant has even been found in Antarctic ice. DHMO has caused millions of dollars of property damage in the midwest, and recently California.

[BIG SNIP]

mikesmith
Reply to  H.R.
June 24, 2021 9:35 am

Here are three more web pages detailing the dangers of DHMO:
https://www.dhmo.org/facts.html

https://www.dhmo.org/truth/Dihydrogen-Monoxide.html

http://bandhmo.org/
AND (historical background):
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/501907/14-year-old-who-convinced-people-ban-dihydrogen-monoxide
In the spring of 1997, a 14-year-old’s school science fair project made a convincing argument to ban a dangerous chemical compound: dihydrogen monoxide, known as DHMO. Nathan Zohner, a junior high school student in Idaho, gave 50 of his fellow students a report called “Dihydrogen Monoxide: The Unrecognized Killer,” which accurately laid out the dangers of DHMO, convincing the majority [86%] of students to call for its ban. The experiment caused enough of a splash that it was picked up by The Washington Post.
SNIP

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/1997/10/21/dihydrogen-monoxide-unrecognized-killer/ee85631a-c426-42c4-bda7-ed63db993106/
SNIP
Last spring, Nathan Zohner, an enterprising 14-year-old student at Eagle Rock Junior High School in Idaho Falls, Idaho, conducted his science fair project on just this theme. Nathan distributed a tongue-in-cheek report that had been kicking around the Internet, “Dihydrogen Monoxide: The Unrecognized Killer” (from which the quotes above are drawn), to 50 of his classmates.

These are smart kids who had studied chemistry; many of them, like Nathan, have parents who work at the nearby Idaho Nuclear Engineering and Environmental Laboratory. Nathan simply asked them to read the report (which is completely factual) and decide what, if anything to do about the chemical. They could even ask the teacher what DHMO was, but none did.

In the end, 43 students, or 86 percent of the sample, “voted to ban dihydrogen monoxide because it has caused too many deaths,” wrote Nathan in the conclusion to his project, adding that he “was appalled that my peers were so easily misled. . . .
SNIP
Says David Murray, research director of the non-profit Statistical Assessment Service in Washington, “The likelihood is high that I could replicate these results with a survey of members of Congress.”

Scissor
Reply to  Robert Arvanitis
June 23, 2021 2:48 pm

Yes, and all that ground level ozone pollution would not form without oxygen.

In fact, without oxygen, there would be far fewer dangers.There would be no fires, so we municipalities could save money by shutting down fire stations, and firefighters would not have to risk their lives in this dangerous line of work. We would no longer have to worry about wildfires too.

I understand that John McAfee gave up oxygen. RIP Mr. McAfee.

Bryan A
Reply to  Scissor
June 23, 2021 3:28 pm

Rust would also be nonexistent

Scissor
Reply to  Bryan A
June 23, 2021 5:22 pm

I should have thought of that. No rust. No rust belt.

alastair gray
Reply to  Robert Arvanitis
June 23, 2021 3:23 pm

Its a slow acting poison that will kill us all but it usually takes 80 – 100 years to get you. Then the anoxic bacteria get the remains

jakee308
Reply to  Robert Arvanitis
June 24, 2021 2:47 am

Don’t forget dihydrogen oxide. It is a universal acid and dissolves most solids. Physical immersion for just a short length of time can lead to asphyxia or death. When solid it can make driving hazardous destructive of building roofs and in it’s vapor to liquid changeover can cause destructive winds and destroy private homes.

Call your senator now to have this dangerous chemical removed from availability.

B Clarke
June 23, 2021 2:20 pm

And so it begins.

Zig Zag Wanderer
Reply to  B Clarke
June 23, 2021 2:48 pm

The greatest civilization yet, ending not with a bang, as predicted, but with a sad series of blackouts….

B Clarke
Reply to  Zig Zag Wanderer
June 23, 2021 3:34 pm

I don’t know were in the world you aree my friend, start preparing.

Zig Zag Wanderer
Reply to  B Clarke
June 23, 2021 7:23 pm

Well, where I am right now, electricity and phones are literally 100s of miles apart, with zero travelling possible in the wet season, so people are pretty self-reliant.

JamesD
Reply to  Zig Zag Wanderer
June 24, 2021 8:36 am

I used to wonder how Rome collapsed and we entered into a dark age. Now I know.

Rud Istvan
June 23, 2021 2:27 pm

Just did a little research. The NE US PJM grid has an official dispatchable reserve capacity margin of 16.1%. Germany has no dispatchable reserve standard at all. That is long term fatal to grid reliability. And Germany is interconnected to Austria, Norway, Netherlands, Denmark, and Belgium. They will take down most of Northern Europe.

Zig Zag Wanderer
Reply to  Rud Istvan
June 23, 2021 2:46 pm

Griff’s socialist utopia in the making

Krishna Gans
Reply to  Rud Istvan
June 23, 2021 3:18 pm

I think you forgot the connection to France

Rud Istvan
Reply to  Krishna Gans
June 23, 2021 3:32 pm

Yup

B Clarke
Reply to  Krishna Gans
June 23, 2021 3:35 pm

France will be busy supplying the UK or not as the case may be.

saveenergy
Reply to  B Clarke
June 23, 2021 4:54 pm

UK gets an average 7.5% of it’s annual electricity from Europe.

They used to be our best friends, but we don’t like them any more & left their club, so in a cold winter, who do you think they will they supply first, Germany or UK ???

Reply to  saveenergy
June 23, 2021 5:36 pm

Money talks. It will go to the highest bidder.

Reply to  saveenergy
June 23, 2021 10:01 pm

The EU is not the French power companies that sell nuclear power.
Britain has enough margin to supply itself. It even exports to France in winter.
Germany only has so much cross border interconnects. In extremis Germany would shut down with those links disconnected.

Reply to  Rud Istvan
June 23, 2021 5:12 pm

The ENTSO-E map is helpful.

https://www.entsoe.eu/data/map/

Germany also has connections with Poland, Czechia, Sweden and Switzerland. Of course, the European grid stretches all the way from Turkey to Portugal, but excludes the Nordpool countries and the Baltic states They nearly had a major blackout on January 8th, caused by loss of transmission capacity in Croatia, when tripped several other lines from Romania and Hungary, leading to a 6GW shortfall in Northern Europe and corresponding surplus in Southern Europe, which split into islanded grids. The over-frequency in the South tripped some blackouts, as well as knocking off power stations as far away as Turkey. The under-frequency in the North led to extensive contracted load shedding and some involuntary blackout until reserve generation could be brought online. It took some time to re-synchronise the grids once the faults had been cleared. More detail on that available from here:

https://www.entsoe.eu/news/2021/02/26/system-separation-in-the-continental-europe-synchronous-area-on-8-january-2021-interim-report/

The real problem is with planned closures, which may get accelerated by market conditions: coal plant is struggling to survive in the face of surging carbon prices, never mind Green pressure for closure. Timera explained the problems here:

https://timera-energy.com/carbon-closures-capacity-crunch-in-germany/

Put in simple terms, Germany needs to replace 8 GW of nuclear (closing by end of 2022), 15GW of coal and 14GW of lignite capacity (most of which will now likely close by the mid 2020s). The majority of these units have been running at relatively high load factors i.e. orders of magnitude more GW of wind & solar capacity is required to replace it, given lower average load factors (& even lower derating factors).

German power demand is also set to increase significantly from mid-decade as transport is electrified and electrolysers come online to meet Germany’s hydrogen targets.

That’s up to 37GW of closures out of just under 60GW of dispatchable capacity remaining at the moment, with only 2.4 GW of new gas generation being built or planned. Some of that new generation is peaker OCGT plant, limited to only 1,500 hours a year of operation. That is going to bite hard. A look at German generation at the time of that near blackout shows up to 58 GW being met by dispatchable power at peak times

https://energy-charts.info/charts/power/chart.htm?l=en&c=DE&year=2021&legendItems=11111111111111110&week=01

The cross border flows detailed in the next chart did add up to net exports, but the buffer represented by that would soon erode – the neighbours also need power, else there would be no exports

https://energy-charts.info/charts/power/chart.htm?l=en&c=DE&year=2021&legendItems=111111111111&week=01&source=cbpf_saldo&stacking=stacked_absolute

Prices are going to soar when there’s a period of Dunkelflaute – little wind or sun in very cold weather. As Timera put it:

It is the ‘storage & interconnectors’ bit of the narrative which appears to be the Achilles heel of Germany’s approach, for two reasons:

  1. The flexible capacity required to maintain an orderly power market transition is much broader than ‘storage & interconnectors’
  2. There is currently no price signal mechanism to support investment in the flexibility required.

Although there are some sections of both industry and government that understand this challenge, Germany’s current policy framework appears to be flirting with major power market disorder across the next 2 – 3 years. By that we mean major network stress events, price spikes and a structural rise in price volatility.

Reply to  Rud Istvan
June 23, 2021 6:35 pm

Small correction on German capacity: it will fall below 60GW of dispatchable by 2023 after the closure of nuclear and announced closures of lignite and coal.

The current picture is in this chart from Bundesnetzagentur

comment image

For those with no German: Kernenergie – nuclear; Braunkohle – lignite; Steinkohle – steam coal; Erdgas – Natural Gas; Mineralölprodukte – Diesel; Pumpspeicher – pumped storage; Sonstige – others; Laufwasser – run of river hydro; Speicherwasser – Hydro dam (no pumping)

mikesmith
Reply to  Rud Istvan
June 24, 2021 9:41 am

If the worst happens one of these days, how long will it take them to get back up? For most people in industrial societies, electricity is just as necessary for survival as food, water, and air. 3 minutes without air, 3 days without water, 3 weeks without food–3 months without power??? Or is that too optimistic?

Reply to  mikesmith
June 24, 2021 11:06 am

Too optimistic IMO. Societal breakdown will occur long before 3 months. Look at the history of long-term outages over the past couple decades.

Thomas Gasloli
June 23, 2021 2:32 pm

Coming soon to a grid near you. And maybe a good thing, frequent blackouts are the only way to educate the public so this insanity ends.

John the Econ
Reply to  Thomas Gasloli
June 23, 2021 2:46 pm

Unfortunately so. One of the many failures of our educational systems is not teaching people about the infrastructure that makes our historically easy lives possible. Too many will just consider this rhetoric until the lights go out and they won’t be able to tweet in complaint.

Bryan A
Reply to  John the Econ
June 23, 2021 3:32 pm

Now Now, haven’t you heard Xo Bai-Den’s words on Infrastructure? Power supplies and the wires that deliver them aren’t Infrastructure…
Infrastructure is People, people who enter the country illegally so they can vote Democrat

John the Econ
Reply to  Bryan A
June 23, 2021 4:41 pm

…and daycare and paid leave and giant decorative squids…

Carlo, Monte
Reply to  Bryan A
June 23, 2021 4:53 pm

“Build Back Better”?

Newminster
Reply to  John the Econ
June 24, 2021 3:37 am

As James Burke reminded us in Connections 30+ years ago!

Zig Zag Wanderer
Reply to  Thomas Gasloli
June 23, 2021 2:49 pm

Don’t worry, they’ll blame it on fossil fuels somehow.

Reply to  Zig Zag Wanderer
June 23, 2021 11:35 pm

Like they did in Texas

Sage
Reply to  Thomas Gasloli
June 23, 2021 3:32 pm

I wish I had your faith.

California policy maker have learned nothing from the last two summers.

Reply to  Sage
June 23, 2021 7:18 pm

There was that (for now) cancellation of shutting down several gas fired plants in CA.

Joe Crawford
June 23, 2021 2:51 pm

You can tell a kid time and time again not to play with fire, he never listens. But, give him 5 minutes of field experience and he learns it. In other words, the BMWi won’t learn until they suffer one or more Texas style grid outages. Then they will listen.

Reply to  Joe Crawford
June 24, 2021 9:57 am

You sure about that? Doesn’t seem like anyone really learned from Texas.

Paul Penrose
Reply to  TonyG
June 25, 2021 10:06 am

One time can be “explained away” as an aberration, a rare event that won’t happen again; but it’s much more difficult to sell that story on the second or third occurrence. Some children just require more correction to learn than others.

Mr.
June 23, 2021 2:53 pm

I was just reading an article that described the new “crisis” facing the environment.

Unsurprisingly, it was about the “tsunami” of obsolete / redundant domestic solar panels that have bugger-all financially viable recyclable materials, and will be appearing globally in the next 2 decades.

Landfills will be at a premium.
Mostly filled with exploded greenie heads.

Drake
Reply to  Mr.
June 24, 2021 2:50 pm

Link please?

June 23, 2021 2:53 pm

This is what I call the “green” virus … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpVAHZCNTa8&t

Abolition Man
Reply to  John Shewchuk
June 23, 2021 5:00 pm

Another excellent video, John!
Hopefully, some day soon, children all over the country will see them and leave the panic and fear mongering behind!

Reply to  Abolition Man
June 23, 2021 6:17 pm

Thanks for the like Mr. Abolition. It’s tough getting videos out there for the “walking woke” crowd, so I try to keep them short. But after listening to AOC, hopefully they take note before 2031 … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9OeWswZGaQ&t

Rory Forbes
Reply to  John Shewchuk
June 23, 2021 9:18 pm

That there is excellent material, Mr. Shewchuck. You’ve got a talent for the presentation of complex materials.

TonyL
June 23, 2021 3:09 pm

People are of the opinion that these countries must learn the hard way. power outages and grid failure is what it takes to wake people up and fix things.

I do not think so.
Even a catastrophic grid collapse will teach them nothing. Even such a huge failure as a grid collapse will be blamed on….
wait for it……
will be blamed on …. Global Warming!!!!!

Rud Istvan notes that one grid in the US has a 16% reserve capacity. The engineers deem this prudent, and have forever. Yet everywhere we look, “renewables” do not really provide new power insofar as they simply chew into reserve capacity. Eventually, reserve capacity goes to 0%. It is impossible for grid operators not to know what happens next. Yet the “renewables” beat goes on.

Bill Rocks
Reply to  TonyL
June 24, 2021 7:23 am

I repeat the wise words from TonyL,

“Yet everywhere we look, “renewables” do not really provide new power insofar as they simply chew into reserve capacity. Eventually, reserve capacity goes to 0%.”

Rich T.
June 23, 2021 3:13 pm

They might learn something. But it will be blamed on CC. No fault of our own. But will it take out all of the EU grid. Or will the grid protect itself by isolating Germany. The pipeline will help but not if they shut off the nuclear and coal, gas power stations. Given that this will happen again during this Grand Solar Minimum. https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/02/07/winter-storm-threatens-germanys-powerfreezing-hell-threatens-if-already-rickety-grid-collapses/ . Maybe more than once. Since the EU haven’t had a real spring. Summer?. Look out for winter! 21-22.

alastair gray
June 23, 2021 3:21 pm

The only reason I voted for Brexit was to get the UK out of the impending Euro-Energy doom that anyone with any sense could see. Now the buffoonish Johnson turns out to be a fully paid up XR loon along with his family and cronies, and is leading us over the precipice even faster. I weep for western civilization

Reply to  alastair gray
June 23, 2021 10:04 pm

Exactly my position too.

Rud Istvan
June 23, 2021 3:31 pm

There is a second German grid problem to report, uncovered while researching the above comment. Much of the German wind power is in central and northern Germany. A lot of the coal, CCGT, and nuclear is in the south and east. For NIMBY reasons, the grid has been unable to add sufficient north/south transmission. So it is places like Schwaben (Mercedes) and Bavaria (BMW) that will be hit hardest as conventional generation is retired per Energiewende. The fairly new massive CCGT at Irsching in Bavaria was forced to close less than half thru its design life because it wasn’t economic when just run intermittently, and the German government refused to pay Irsching a fair price for just standing by as dispatchable reserve about 40% of the time.

Reply to  Rud Istvan
June 23, 2021 5:34 pm

Add in further lunacies. It is now policy that at least 15% of wind should be built in the South (precisely because of the lack of grid capacity you allude to). But it’s not exactly a windswept area, as you can verify here

https://globalwindatlas.info/

so capacity factors will be low and much less economic.

Also remember that neighbouring countries have installed phase shift transformers on the borders to block German use of their grids for transmitting power from North to South.

And of course, Germany are far from the only ones pursuing insanity. Although France has now deferred a lot of its previously planned nuclear closures, Belgium seems set on going ahead. It’s far from clear that their plans are workable:

https://www.brusselstimes.com/news/belgium-all-news/167347/belgium-council-of-ministers-approves-auction-of-two-to-three-gas-fired-power-plants-tinne-van-der-straeten-crm-bill-nuclear-phaseout/

already there are times when the NEMO link to the UK is used for imports of power to Belgium, relying on exports from France to supply it. And of course the UK is also a big poster boy, albeit its nuclear closures are being forced by maintenance issues at old plants. But the coal that just kept the lights on over last winter will be gone.

We will have bidding wars for avoiding blackouts. At say €4-6,000/MWh, it may not necessarily be best to win the bids. Importing at 10GW would generate a bill of over €1bn a day.

Tom
June 23, 2021 3:53 pm

Good, and the sooner the better.

Brian
June 23, 2021 3:56 pm

As they used to say when I was a kid: Let the bastards freeze in the dark.

n.n
Reply to  Brian
June 23, 2021 6:41 pm

demos-cracy die in darkness h/t WaPo

Deb
June 23, 2021 4:00 pm

Deb
Time to fire up the rocket stove!

Serge Wright
June 23, 2021 4:04 pm

It’s becoming clear that the people in charge are aware of the outcomes but wish to proceed regardless. Perhaps this has always been their plan ?. If your end goal is to reset the system then creating anarchy in the streets by cutting the power is a good way to create mass civil unrest and after you have killed the liberal democracy then you can use the power grid as a means to control people. This might sound crazy, but so does removing the nuclear power, which is by far the best source of emissions free energy by a long way.

markl
June 23, 2021 4:20 pm

When the lights go out they can blame it on anything they want but people who have been accustomed to reliable energy their whole life know how it is achieved, how it was lost, and word smithing won’t convince them otherwise. It will be political suicide, and none too soon.

John Endicott
Reply to  markl
June 24, 2021 8:51 am

Sadly if the electorate where that knowledgeable, they wouldn’t have voted in the bums who are pushing this nonsense in the first place. In other words don’t be to sure that enough of them can connect the dots as to why they’re sitting, freezing in the dark.

observa
June 23, 2021 4:36 pm

One side effect of the fossil fuel alarmists succeeding with their doom and gloom is Oz seems to be warming to the nuclear power option-
‘Incredible growth’ in the number of Australians ‘supporting the use of nuclear power’ (msn.com)

I’ve certainly noticed the heat’s gone out of opposition to nukes and the alarmists have succeeded most in convincing the young that it’s time has come. Perhaps they’ve woken up it would be nigh on impossible to fill our garages with Teslas without it as the demise of coal power means no off peak at night to refuel. Quite the contrary in fact as that becomes peak power cost time as they’re being constantly reminded with crashing solar FIT rates and the push for TOU power metering. That’s where the average punter knows something’s not right with the unreliables.

Reply to  observa
June 23, 2021 10:09 pm

yes. The nuclear industry is running a slow but steady drip feed of ‘nuclear is Green’ into the narrative.

With people like Gates and Bezos pouring money in, it should help.

June 23, 2021 4:51 pm

Russia nor China need to hack or sabotage the western world’s power grids we are doing it ourself.

observa
Reply to  Carlo, Monte
June 23, 2021 11:54 pm

“By incentivizing, primarily through rates, charging behaviors that capitalize on when renewable energy is being generated—we basically have a win for the grid, and we have a win for the drivers in terms of reduced rates. Rates are a climate strategy, and California plans on using rates to help drive the charging behaviors”

Reads: We’re gunna slug you heaps to charge your EV at home at night whereas when you’re parked up for work during the day with no charger it will be dirt cheap.

Cost benefit! What in Gaia’s name is that?
Benefits of $1.3b Vic solar scheme unknown (msn.com)

Olen
June 23, 2021 5:12 pm

Not just blackouts but shutting down the modern world to save it. Will it be worth it, no.

Rud Istvan
June 23, 2021 5:13 pm

Big fan of the crash test dummy engineering test system. One learns a lot. California, Hawaii, UK, and Germany have knowingly volunteered for same. Texas arguably did not, knowingly, but almost became one anyway in Feb 21. Let the renewable blackout grid crashes begin. Sooner is better than later.

Abolition Man
June 23, 2021 5:18 pm

No less a scientist than Albert Einstein mused that human stupidity might well be infinite! It’s too bad that GangGreen seems so intent on proving him correct!
The suicide death cult of Climastrology was never about saving the planet; it has always been about gaining power and control over Western economies! It’s too bad that the Marxists in charge of the cult never read or understood the fairy tale of the goose laying golden eggs! Most young children used to be able to tell how this would turn out; now most committed alarmists won’t see the problems until they get smacked in the head with them!

June 23, 2021 5:42 pm

What could go wrong when the American president wants his country to go green and pump less oil at home and rather import oil from Russia?

pochas94
June 23, 2021 5:48 pm

These are people that either can’t do arithmetic or are owned by the Chinese.

June 23, 2021 6:05 pm

Politicians have the remarkable ability to fail to see the blindingly obvious.

Editor
June 23, 2021 6:11 pm

Germany and Texas (my home) are screwed.

Terry
June 23, 2021 6:15 pm

Fewer BMW’s – mechanics weep.

Rud Istvan
June 23, 2021 6:15 pm

An oft repeated meme joke:
A: What did Greens use for night light before candles? A: Electricity.

June 23, 2021 6:34 pm

This is very, very GOOD news. If the blackouts occur in the next three years in Germany, that will put the brakes on our (USA) push to wind and solar.

Reply to  joel
June 23, 2021 7:25 pm

A silly belief.

griff
Reply to  joel
June 25, 2021 5:41 am

but they won’t. They haven’t happened since they launched Energiewende, despite constant prophecies they would in Watts etc. Homewood’s prediction that the German grid would fail last winter was so off that Snopes fact checked it as ‘fake news’

June 23, 2021 7:14 pm

If they are all going to die from overheating soon, why worry about the power supply?

bill Johnston
June 23, 2021 7:16 pm

“on the whole, we have sufficient energy for Germany”. Right. That is what Texas thought also.

lee
Reply to  bill Johnston
June 24, 2021 12:41 am

I wonder how many seconds there are in a (w)hole?

MarkW
Reply to  bill Johnston
June 24, 2021 8:41 am

He’s talking about average power.
The problem is that people don’t consume average power, they consume the power that is available one second to the next. If the power they need right here, right now, isn’t available, the grid collapses.

Walter Sobchak
June 23, 2021 7:23 pm

Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of guys.

Ghandi
June 23, 2021 8:00 pm

The president of Toyota recently revealed the “elephant in the room” regarding electric vehicles when he explained in a Wall Street Journal op-ed column that if every car and truck in Japan was an electric vehicle, they would need to use ALL of Japan’s electricity produced in one year to power the EVs and it would only last for six months! There is just not enough electrical power currently produced to power a complete switch to electric vehicles, let alone if we reduce output from coal and natural gas powered electric generating plants.

Reply to  Ghandi
June 23, 2021 11:56 pm

Greenies don’t understand Conservation of Energy.

Reply to  Graemethecat
June 24, 2021 10:14 am

“Greenies don’t understand Conservation of Energy.”

I was just told a few days ago that there is no such thing.

My My what a mess
Reply to  Ghandi
June 24, 2021 3:14 am

That’s why there is a plan for 20 minute neighbourhoods in the UK. Us Plebs wont be able to afford / run an EV and there will not be enough of them to go round for that very reason.

June 23, 2021 8:48 pm

Basically this is a battle between the Engineers and the Magical Thinkers.
Before the SHTF

And the engineers will be correct because reality versus magical thinking never works in the real world.

John
June 23, 2021 11:20 pm

listen to the AEMO (Australian Energy Market )
South Australia can be 100% renewable – just add interconnectors to equally unreliable Victoria and New South Wales (they in the process of shutting all there coal fired stations)
and hope Tasmania’s two interconnectors and hydro can balance power with South Australia’s BS elon musk 129MWh battery – note the small “h” it is important technically but the green liars dont understand
it is not continuous power you can use it any way you like but in is limited energy

the wheels are falling off our electrical generation billy carts (other people call them soap box carts) and the crash ain’t going to be pretty
whats worse all those idiots with electric cars are also F..d
shame that the hospitals wont have any power for you when you need them

lain Reid
June 23, 2021 11:37 pm

As I have said before, generally, people do not differentiate between renewable electricity and conventional electricity and think that the former is equal to and can simply replace the latter.
The media does not mention the technical deficiencies of renewables and if there are any negative comments it will be about intermittency, (itself a real challenge and expensive to compensate for, batteries are mistakenly believed to be the answer for that) but not that a stable grid cannot have a large amount of uncontrollable renewable generation feeding into it. Thus, the perception will remain in most peoples mind.

Until this perception is altered, especially amongst politicians, the renewable snowball will keep on going until the inevitable and long loss of power.

Dennis G Sandberg
June 23, 2021 11:56 pm

Germany has essentially had their wind additions on hold since the end of 2017. They installed more wind that year then in the past four years combined. I’m looking for a few thousand mW of CCGT to be added 2023-2025 now that Nord Stream II will be up and running later this year.

griff
Reply to  Dennis G Sandberg
June 25, 2021 5:40 am

Well that’s not true, if you look at offshore wind…

but here’s an assessment of what might happen with gas

The combination of less conventional power generation in the South and the (possible) delay in the construction of power lines that would deliver the much-needed wind power from the North has triggered calls for new gas-fired power stations to be used as a bridging technology. “There will be situations where we will need back-up from gas power plants,” Kapferer said. He said Germany would need some 40 GW of gas capacity in the medium to long-term (total peak load in Germany is currently at 80 GW; current gas capacity at 30 GW). The Federal Network Agency lists a total of 2.5 GW in new battery, pumped hydro and gas capacity to come online between 2021 and 2023.

The situation of gas plants in Germany is a difficult one. Existing gas power stations have long lain idle as they were outpriced by cheaper renewable, coal and nuclear electricity. A good example is the gas-fired plant at Irsching, once hailed as one of the most modern and efficient plants in the world and practically mothballed since before 2017. Only when the price for emissions under the European Emission Trading System (EU ETS) as well as the wholesale power price started rising in 2020 did some of these plants get back into the black.
This is still not enough reassurance for investors to think about building new plants, as critics of Germany’s Energy Only Market (EOM) have often stressed.

griff
June 24, 2021 12:40 am

Well here’s a very detailed, warts and all discussion of ‘can Germany maintain supply security’.

Shutting down nuclear and coal – can Germany maintain supply security on renewables alone? | Clean Energy Wire

Not a simple issue. you can pick the good points or the bad points, but you can say the issue is out there in active discussion and they are working on the points raised.

This is an update on the critical north/south grid improvements

Pandemic slows German grid planning but central powerlines show progress | Clean Energy Wire

George Daddis
Reply to  griff
June 24, 2021 7:00 am

“The issue is out there in active discussion..”
An issue that they created by themselves.
The answer is simple and Bob Newhart said it best: “Just Stop It!”

Ed Zuiderwijk
June 24, 2021 2:22 am

A prolongued blackout would be the best time to stage a revolt. Communictions will be down, so no organised opposition. However, you should get your own logistics sorted well before it happens. Be prepared. You will find the morons who engineered the chaos in their offices hiding under their desks.

Reply to  Ed Zuiderwijk
June 24, 2021 10:15 am

Depending on how prolonged, such a blackout could completely collapse a nation.

jakee308
June 24, 2021 2:41 am

The damage (which includes humans and other animals physical harm) is not a bug. It’s a feature. These people promoting this “renewable energy” and not interested in preserving Germany’s (or any country’s) way of life or economy.

They’re part of the same movement that believes all governments that are capitalist orientated have and are doing nothing but harm and need to be stopped. And they’re getting the very people who will suffer to do it to themselves.

The people in power will not be harmed much for quite a while so they don’t really care. They’ll just invest in a gas run power plant for themselves and buy stock in all the boondoggle green energy companies that will be getting funding from the government.

No it’s going to be the lower to middle income folks who will have their lives lessened including their health care degraded and potentially turn fatal due to unexpected blackouts.

Bon apetit suckers.

Pamela Matlack-Klein
June 24, 2021 5:25 am

“For power grid expert Herbert Saurugg, “the danger of a blackout is getting closer and closer if the government does not act,” reports Avantour .”

But it is this same government that is doing all the stupid renewable stuff and shutting down existing coal and nuclear! What, exactly, does Saurugg want the government to do?

Drake
Reply to  Pamela Matlack-Klein
June 24, 2021 3:16 pm

Look at George Daddis’ post above, watch the video, and listen to what Bob is telling the government to do!

Daniel
June 24, 2021 6:35 am

[SNIP. Comments such as this have no place here. -mod]

griff
Reply to  Daniel
June 25, 2021 5:38 am

Seriously? You are posting groundless anti islamic statements and nobody has called you on it?

2hotel9
June 24, 2021 7:55 am

Easy fix, bring on more gas, coal and nuclear electric generation capacity. Damned sight cheaper and more reliable than wind and solar. And much better for the environment.

June 24, 2021 8:47 am

We are constantly being assured by commentors around here that there won’t be any grid problems or blackouts, so this can’t possibly be true, right?

Dan M
June 24, 2021 1:42 pm

Suicide is not painless.

SherlockHomeless
June 24, 2021 3:27 pm

Just think what it will be like when @ 85000,000 vehicles get plugged in every evening.,

observa
June 24, 2021 4:02 pm

You pay generators to dump on the grid so naturally you have to pay to clean up the dumping- U.S. Democrats launch bill allowing existing nuclear plants tax credit (msn.com)
That’s how Green GDP works.

JAW3
June 24, 2021 4:12 pm

The blackouts are a feature not a bug in their race to the good old days pre-industrial.

June 24, 2021 10:44 pm

RT (untermenschen times) has a nice article about solar panels creating a mountain of trash that will negate any conceivable environmental gain from the highly disposable technology – and then some:

https://www.rt.com/op-ed/527472-solar-panels-create-more-waste/

June 25, 2021 4:53 am

The RE-fanatical German government, which has a “know-it-all”, “follow-our-example”, RE politics-driven mindset, will not learn until it is nuked with blackouts, a la Texas, California, etc.

Germany, during a major freeze in winter, with minimal wind/solar, minimal nukes plants, minimal coal plants, will not be able to generate enough electricity to prevent black-outs.

The “all-our-studies-prove” German government says “we will import what we need”, but nearby countries also will have cold weather, also will have minimal wind/solar, etc.

The heavily subsidized wind/solar/battery fantasy finally will hit the wall, big time.
Stay tuned.

Oh yes, the US government tells the EU and Germany not to buy more low-cost, clean-burning Russian gas, which the EU and Germany desperately needs!

US government hatred/fear of Russia has overruled common sense.

griff
Reply to  Willem Post
June 25, 2021 5:37 am

The German energy ministry is confident that – even in the difficult years just after the nuclear phase-out – this process will not endanger the power supply of companies and households. In a reply to parliamentarians, it wrote in March 2021: “All analyses of supply security known to the federal government and carried out in accordance with the latest scientific findings come to the conclusion that the secure supply of electricity in Germany will remain guaranteed at the current high level for the foreseeable future. The analyses also take into account the phase-out of nuclear energy and the end of coal-fired power generation.

MarkW
Reply to  Willem Post
June 25, 2021 6:03 am

In your opinion, it makes sense to make your economy dependent on a ruthless dictator who has a history of using economic resources to force other countries to behave in ways that only benefit Russia?

John Sandhofner
June 25, 2021 11:56 am

Do this idiots not understand that without massive battery backup (which don’t exist) there are times when the sun don’t shine and the wind isn’t blowing. Every night like clockwork the sun sets. You can count on it. The wind is a lot hard to schedule because of it’s variability. You will always need a certain amount of coal and nuclear on line available to back up solar and wind when they are fail to perform.