By P Gosselin on 5. July 2022
Germany’s intensifying gas and energy crisis…
Into winter chaos without extending power plant operation
By Prof. Fritz Vahrenholt
(Translated by P. Gosselin, one hyperlink added)
There is another taboo law that the German federal government does not want to touch: the nuclear phase-out law. Most people in Germany have seen through the inane statements of the Green president of the Federal Network Agency, Klaus Müller, according to whom nuclear power plants do not generate heat and therefore do not help with the gas shortage.
But 14% of electricity comes from gas-fired power plants. We will only be able to replace two-thirds of the gas-fired power plants by ramping up reserve coal-fired power plants. In the end, eliminating three nuclear power plants means giving up a large part of this saving, because the electricity that is eliminated cannot be replaced in any other way than by gas-fired power plants.
Even the accelerated expansion of wind power and solar energy (which, by the way, only produces electricity) will not help. In order to replace the amount of electricity of the three running nuclear power plants arithmetically, one needs two thirds of the 2.2 million existing solar plants. In other words : to replace this amount of electricity, we need five to ten years to replace the resulting gap of about 35 TWh with new PV plants. And then we would still have no electricity at night.
Power company Evonik CEO Christian Kullmann vividly described the extent of the gas crisis: Imagine a train transporting gas that starts in Seville and ends in Frankfurt [1860 km], one wagon at a time the whole way. And he poses the question of how long the German chemical industry would be able to get by on this gas quantity. Mind you, only the chemical industry. Answer: 6 hours. It’s about 5.6 million jobs affected by the lack of natural gas. It is not about taking shorter showers.
In 2018 President Trump during a speech at UNO in NY warned Germany about its overreliance on gas and fossil fuels from Russia. The german delegation ironically and blatantly laughed at him.
They’re not at all laughing now: Wood-burning stoves and firewood are in short supply in Germany as citizens fear freezing to death due to gas shortages.They’re Not Laughing Now: Wood-burning Stoves and Firewood in Short Supply in Germany as Citizens Fear Freezing to Death Due to Gas Shortages (thegatewaypundit.com)
During the 1980s, West Germany was the undisputed industrial leader of Europe–the three largest chemical manufacturing companies in the WORLD were all German, and Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Volkswagen dominated the European car market. Most of the scientists who made discoveries leading to the nuclear power industry were also German.
The only reason why France was even remotely competitive with Germany during those years was the extensive development of the French nuclear power industry, which enabled France to export electricity to neighboring countries, while enjoying relatively inexpensive power costs. At the time, Electricite de France did not want to bury their nuclear wastes in France, and managed to convince Germany to bury them there!
Since about 2000, Germany seems to be “stuck on stupid” energy-wise, shutting down nuclear power plants and coal-fired plants and promoting solar and wind power in a country where most of the land area is above 50 degrees North latitude, dominated by cloudy weather. Even if CO2 did promote a warming of the climate, such a warming would be welcomed by Germans accustomed to cold, wet weather most of the year.
The idea that “nuclear power plants don’t produce heat” is ludicrous. Nuclear fission releases heat energy, and the reactor temperature is maintained using a jacket containing water or some other cooling fluid, which is then used to generate steam, from which electricity is generated. Coal-fired power plants also use the heat from burning coal to generate steam.
It’s true that nuclear energy is not as well-adapted to home heating as natural gas. But it is still a good idea to use nuclear energy to provide electricity, and save the gas for heating homes through the long, dark, cold German winter, especially after Russia turns off the gas spigot.
not a peep from Griff, weird
The robo-griff is still being tested for replacement of paid trolls with standardized statements. That is to counter the rising costs of troll networks calling for unions and extra vacation travel to exotic beaches.
Bali appears to be quite popular with those of a certain leftwing trollish mindset.
Will they get ‘high’ in Bali?
Converting electricity to heat only takes a $50 electric heater, and if the gas runs out that is exactly what Germans will buy. If only they had some nuclear generation plants to power those heaters they could survive.
A lot of homes in France were built that way, because it’s cheaper to have a 9 kVA (rather than the standard 6 kVA) electric main than to have a gas connection, gas heater, plumbing etc.
When I was young, there was A LOT of pushback against those, as they were viewed as the result of EDF so called culture of “only nuke” (which is made up).
Also, the same people said that it produced a lot of CO2… thinking that all electric heating is the result of too much nuke and also that nukes can’t power these radiators.
The end result is objectively higher power consumption when it’s very cold, and it’s often a problem.
Meanwhile….
WSJ
Gas and Nuclear Power Can Be ‘Green’ Under New EU PlanThe European Union voted to include nuclear power and natural gas in the bloc’s list of investments deemed sustainable, clearing the way for the two energy sources to be included in the EU’s so-called green taxonomy.
Germany and the EU really didn’t need the German export model for its economy after all. /s
Where are all of our trolls? They have been constantly informing us that Germany doesn’t need FF because they have wind and solar. It has been spectacularly successful and we just need more of it.
Time for Ardern in New Zealand to wake up to the Green nightmare, re-open Marsden Point, and restart coal mining. But first, we want an admission of her mistakes, and preferably her resignation. The UN is welcome to her!
We have an election, in roughly 15 months. I hope Ardern and Co. keep going exactly as they are now – because the resulting chaos, and rising outrage over divisive racial aristocracy policies, is likely to bury the Labour/Green cabal for the next 2 decades. Which is about how long it is going to take us to build our way out of the hole she has dropped us in. But at least we may have stopped digging. I hope
Nuclear plants have cooling towers. But to avoid going down the wrong path further, if you have nuke plants that have life in them, use them. Retro fit gas energy plants to burn coal or 2nd fuel. Not that hard.
That should speed up the elimination of most of those pesky pensioners and make money available for more unreliables. After all, the Green solution to the problem of unreliable production of electricity by unreliables is to “invest” in more unreliables.
I suspect the Germans will only act sensibly after their power supply fails and many manufacturing plants have to shut down, with consequential serious drop in the German GDP! “Hit them in the pocket” is something they will understand, but even then I bet the stupid Greenies won’t give in. It will be up to the non-Greenies to insist on logical action!
https://then24.com/2022/07/04/oscar-lafontaine-opens-nord-stream-2/
““I can no longer hear the whining from Steinmeier, Scholz and others about the social upheavals that will arise if the price of gas triples. “
I always thought this was humorous but it now looks prophetic:
Dumb As It Gets?
Gosselin’s TricksZone should think a bit before pompously writing such statements.
Germany’s major problems wrt gas is not at all to be viewed in the electricity production.
The two major problems are:
Even keeping 10 nuclear plants working wouldn’t change anything to that.
Electricity is in Germany and anywhere else no more than about 20 % of all energy needed.
Germany have voted them. Now they get the reward. Someone speculates that German government deliberately put the land in the arms of Russia. Don’t forget that Schroeder was SPD, Merkel was ex DDR and Scholtz, well…let’s forget it.
USA forced its colony (Germany) not to buy russian gas, that is the problem. All german politicans are part of a network controlled by USA. It is time for a “Tea Party” in germany.
And all of this to counter a current level of atmospheric CO2 of four hundredths of one percent and a CO2 increase over the past sixty years of only one hundredth of one percent.