By Ross Pomeroy
At the dawn of the millennium, Germany launched an ambitious plan to transition to renewable energy. “Die Energiewende” initiated a massive expansion of solar and wind power, resulting in a commendable 25 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2022 compared to 2002.
But while Energiewende slashed pollution through building out renewable energy sources, it also phased out Germany’s fleet of safe, carbon-free nuclear power plants, a longtime goal of environmental activists afraid of nuclear’s salient – but in actuality small – dangers. The result, according to a new analysis recently published to the International Journal of Sustainable Energy, has been a boondoggle for consumers and for the environment.
In 2002, nuclear power supplied about a fifth of Germany’s electricity. Twenty-one years later, it supplied none. A layperson might think that cheap wind and solar could simply fill the gap, but it isn’t so simple. Once up and running, nuclear reactors provide reliable, affordable “baseload” power – electricity that’s available all the time. Ephemeral renewables simply can’t match nuclear’s consistency. And since an advanced economy like Germany’s requires a 100 percent reliable power grid, fossil fuel power plants burning coal and natural gas were brought online to pick up wind and solar’s slack.
The net result of German politicians’ shortsightedness in phasing out nuclear power is a vastly pricier grid. The new analysis shows that if Germans simply maintained their 2002 fleet of reactors through 2022, they could have saved themselves roughly $600 billion Euros. Why so much? Well, in addition to their construction costs, renewables required expensive grid upgrades and subsidies. Moreover, in this hypothetical scenario where nuclear remained, Germany enjoyed nearly identical reductions in carbon emissions.
Jan Emblemsvåg, a Professor of Civil Engineering at Norway’s NTNU and the architect of the analysis, imagined another scenario out of curiosity. What if the Germans had taken the money spent on expanding renewables and instead used it to construct new nuclear capacity? According to his calculations, they could have slashed carbon emissions a further 73% on top of their cuts in 2022, while simultaneously enjoying a savings of 330 billion Euros compared to the massive costs of Energiewende.
Policymakers in other countries looking to decarbonize their grids should take note.
This article was originally published by RealClearScience and made available via RealClearWire.
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One disaster based on blind faith and stupidity reminds us of another:
xhosa cattle killing summary
The Xhosa Cattle Killing was a mass resistance movement in
South Africa that took place from April 1856 to June 1857.
The movement was caused by a series of prophecies made
by a 15-year-old girl.
If the Xhosa people killed all their cattle
Their ancestors would rise from the dead
The cattle would come forth from subterranean passages
All the whites would be swept into the sea
People will read a story like this with horrified amazement but even with all the knowledge gained in the last 150 years societies today are just as gullible as then. By the way, was the Xhosa girl named Greta?
According to Wikipedia:
The Salem Witch Trials began after a few local women in the village were accused of witchcraft by four young girls, Betty Parris, Abigail Williams, Ann Putnam, and Elizabeth Hubbard.
There’s always “The Peoples Temple Agricultural Project”
Merkel has a PhD in Physics.
She knew better, but she was pushed by leftist, Socialist know-nothings into closing nuclear plants, promote the ENERGIEWENDE, and allow millions of unskilled, third world, from God knows where, to enter Germany and create all sorts of unrest in staid Germany.
I lived in Germany for three years in the 1950s
I find it unrecognizable to-day
Vander Liar wants to make it worse, not just Germany, but all of Europe
When I lived there, GUEST workers (haha) from Turkey were brought in to do low-skilled factory work.
But the German women, at that time, did not want to go out with them, so they demanded Muslim virgin child brides to be sent from Turkey.
But that was not enough, the whole extended family, on both sides, came as well.
Then the issue arose, where do we go to church.
They demanded Islam churches and Sharia Law
Word got around, Germany was a rich sap, come on down by the millions. etc.
I warned my cousins and they laughed at me.
They are crying in their beer now!
A repeat in the US can be avoided, by electing Trump by a landslide to MAGA
Obama, Clinton, Biden, Harris, Walz, etc., should not be anywhere near the the US government, to stop the weaponizing of the government
You have a very incomplete understanding of the German worker need during the so called economic wonder catapulting Germany into a top position economically.
Could you please state more precisely, what “repeat” you trying to avoid , especially given that there is no Islamic dominated country in the vicinity of the USA and the constitution provides religious freedom (in Germany as well as here). The minimum marriage age limit in USA is 15 and as that lower than in Germany with 16. Cheat undocumented labor is one pillar of American wealth, most (not all) of the unqualified labor in Germany is still documented.
In the 1950, the ratio of adult women to men was 4 to 1, due to Germany losing soldiers by the millions.
It was sheer stupidity to invite GUEST workers from Turkye
Trump was a large employer of illegal aliens at his hotels and golf courses. They were cheap, worked hard and couldn’t complain.
Yes, we know you’re voting for Harris, sc. Hopefully you’ll enjoy the results if she wins.
It is the same story.
Sure, new nuclear in the west. How is Hinkley point doing? Or any of the SMRscams?
France share of nuclear is still falling, their plants failing when it’s too hot.
Spain phasing out.
Do not reply. Simply ignore him.
Just ignore reality you don’t like.
Nothing you type is “real”, it is all just a child-minded fantasy of yours.. see further down..
The nuclear age is coming, and your feeble pathetic whimpering will not stop it..
With too long rotor blades having torsional failures, the end of large wind turbines is near.
3 to 6 MW wind turbines are not viable, except in the windiest areas.
Nuclear has to take its place
That is a problem, because almost all of the world’s nuclear sector is dominated by Russia, China and Korea.
The West is a distant second
Hinkley in the U.K. and the French plant in Finland have huge over-runs, and schedule delays, because incompetence is piled onto woke idiocy
We are at 18MW turbines for offshore by now, the days of growian are long gone.
12 MW units have torsional failures of blades in the North Sea and near Cape Cod.
Luser doesn’t give a crap about polluting the oceans with resins and glass fibre shards as blades gradually disintegrate.
Who is making 18MW turbines? GE Verona cancelled theirs.
China installed 1… 1… and a number of offshore proposals have cancelled because they Can’t Afford to install bigger than 12MW and can’t break even on their bid amount with 12MW
No, we leave that to the climate alarmists
My hope for ignoring a troll has been ignored. I understand fr the perspective of the troll. I kinda understand the stimulus- (emotional)response fr others but you are feeding a monster with the obvious result. My issue is the stupidity of such an approach. We are not in a court of law, there is no judge and ego trumps everything. Sad.
It’s simple. Do not feed the trolls.
Everyone has an opinion, but why tell others what they should or should not do?
That is a good point but one look at the endless to and fro concerning known trolls on this site will confirm that it rarely leads to further insights and instead clutters up the site. It’s a series of dumbning down the line, ad hominems etc. It’s no longer about opinions. It’s a trap and a kind of pathetic warfare. But in the end i have to admit, that is my opinion. I am under no elusion that many posters will actually take my points into consideration but if maybe one or two will halt immediately pushing the red emotional button it will help, especially those who seem to easily fall into the trap. I live in hope..
How is Hinkley point doing?
Let’s bring you up to speed: we have a nunu Labour government now. They started by cancelling the Free Speech Act. Their manifesto is 1984…
You never heard of mental gymnast Ed Miliband?
This started years before the current government. And investors were jumping ship long before that too.
You are funny and so ignorant of the planning system and green loons who refuse to accept they’re very wrong
Nuclear in the UK is currently above wind.. a lot also coming from France’s nuclear.
… and when the wind drops and night comes, the country will be very glad nuclear is able to just keep on providing.
When night comes, and the zombie Alarmists are roaming about.
France boosts nuclear output to 3-year highs during Q1 2024 | Reuters
China Will Generate More Nuclear Power Than Both France and the United States by 2030 – The Diplomat
Spain.. another moronic socialist government trying to destroy their own country’s electricity supply by child-minded virtue-seeking… just DUMB
Meanwhile.. France to build another 14
Spain to phase out nuclear as France adds plants — ANS / Nuclear Newswire
“Scientists in their open letter to the German government pointed to France, the United Kingdom, Poland, the Czech Republic, and the Netherlands, among others—countries that are “planning to build new nuclear power plants or are already doing so, while Belgium and Switzerland are seeking to extend the operating licenses of their plants.””
As I said, and this year the heat troubled them again
Plans for new nuclear in France – awesome – maybe one day Flamanville will be finished, and EDF will not be on the brink of bankruptcy from all that cheap nuclear energy.
Plans for new nuclear, all these emerging countries. The same song and dance over the last decades. Still nuclear renaissance I to XII failed to materialize.
I also wouldn’t gush over about lifetime extensions – that only means no one is financing new ones.
https://thebulletin.org/2023/12/nuclear-expert-mycle-schneider-on-the-cop28-pledge-to-triple-nuclear-energy-production-trumpism-enters-energy-policy/
And now they have fixed the problems.
That is what competent people do. !
Mental stupidity is thinking a country can survive on erratic renewables, without massive 100% support from RELIABLE electricity supply.
Economic bankruptcy come from continually having to subsidies unsustainable wind and solar intermittency.
Germany is finding that out, as their electricity prices continue to skyrocket.
If only they had kept the nuclear power stations going, they might still have a thriving economy, but businesses are shutting, moving to cheaper pastures.
Mental bankruptcy is you !!
A plant was recently completed in the SE US.
It is great that you are obviously thinking a return to FFs is necessary.
You obvious must know by now that wind and solar are too erratic to power anything worthwhile and require near 100% back-up by something RELIABLE..
You don’t want nuclear, because you have a child’s mind and it is very scary to you.
That leaves COAL and GAS.
No arguments from me.
Don’t feed the troll……………
Lifetime extension on Nuclear means far more than “no-one is financing new ones”. Lifetime extension is a perk that can only happen with conventional generation…Coal, Gas, Nuclear). Neither Wind nor Solar can magically have their life extended another 20 years. They require total replacement at inflated prices over original construction costs
It’s nice to know that wind and solar energy systems never fail. /s
Screenshot of Ontario Hydro production, 8/29/24, 07:30 am.
Ontario is building out nuclear capacity and trying hard to keep the media as minimally informed as possible to avoid the anti-nuke lobby’s political interference and lawfare agenda…They see a big market demand coming in New York, just a line on a map away, and they know they will be considered visionaries in a dozen years or so.
Maybe you should ask the Chinese. Installed and operating nuclear power there has increased from 19GW in 2014 to 53GW last year, and is continuing to grow.
The same thing can’t be said for either Solar or Wind as they simply fail after 15 or 20 years respectively and require complete replacement at inflated costs. Even with maintenance they don’t last longer than 20 years, while with maintenance Nuclear can last up to 80 years
Wind will be replaced 4 times in that 80 years and Solar will be replaced 6 times.
Wind will also require 2.5 times the nameplate to equal Nuclear due to Capacity factors while Solar will require up to 6 times
Solar and wind are far more costly that Nuclear when both capacity factor and longevity are comparatively considered
And yet none of them have come close to renouncing their faith, or the narrative.
Nor will they – until events take over.
Energy relies on success. Religion relies on belief.
From the article: ““Die Energiewende” initiated a massive expansion of solar and wind power, resulting in a commendable 25 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2022 compared to 2002.”
Why should German politicians be praised for reducing “carbon emissions” (CO2)? There is no evidence that CO2 needs to be reduced. It cost Germany’s economy $600 billion for this “commendable” reduction.
“But while Energiewende slashed pollution through building out renewable energy sources,”
CO2 is not pollution. CO2 is a benign gas, essential for life on Earth.
The only thing German politicians have managed to do is harm their economy by installing windmills and solar as a substitute for reliable electricity.
CO2-phobes are divorced from reality, and when they are in positions of power, pose a great danger to their own nations. Germany is a prime example of such idiocy.
Certainly some of Germany’s reduction in “carbon emissions” is due to some of their industries moving elsewhere- and the big increase in energy costs- so the public can’t afford to use as much as in the past. Not much to brag about for “green” energy.
How much CO2 was emitted manufacturing those failure prone toys?
The irony is that due to the need for a lot of extra kit and particularly backup. energiewende has not resulted in any reduction in CO2 at all.
“Energiewende slashed pollution through building out renewable energy sources”
Covering the land with wind and solar “farms” is a form of pollution- land pollution. And eye pollution.
Environmental pollution and vandalism.
On a whole-of-life-cycle basis (short as it is), grid wind and solar are probably the most polluting, environmentally destructive and toxic forms of electricity generation.
And it reduces flora that capture and sequester CO2.
A forest right behind this NIMBY’s house was destroyed for a solar “farm”. I made a video of it- which I had on YouTube for several years. I think they had 14 bulldozers on the site at one time- and logging machinery, burning up a lot of diesel! And hundreds of big trucks loaded with gravel to raise the ground level in places- while damaging vernal pools and cutting trees next to a river, against state law. I complained to the state about this but they blew me off because they were pushing solar. But now the greens in Wokeachusetts are against solar “farms” and even industrial battery systems- which would destroy forests because they want the forests to be locked up to do nothing but sequester carbon. They want no more forestry which can improve the forests while sequestering carbon, as if that matters, and it doesn’t.
Is there a word for global madness or similar syndrome?
Not religion or even ideology. Mass lunacy, perhaps, but I would rather not blame the moon for what is self-inflicted.
The UK will not be outdone.
We’ve reached the conclusion the Chancellor has no option but to put fuel duty back up to 58p a litre in October’s Budget.
https://www.gbnews.com/lifestyle/cars/petrol-diesel-prices-chancellor-fuel-duty-hike
Then add 17% VAT onto that. The double whammy.
Only don’t use the Tube…
London Underground stations containing ‘unhealthy’ polluted air exposed by GB News investigation
https://www.gbnews.com/news/video-london-underground-unhealthy-polluted-air-exposed-gb-news-investigation
And Khan couldn’t care less.
Look at all the greenhouse gas (water vapor) that the nuclear facility in the title picture is emitting.
Ask any green, water vapour is not the issue, the issue is carbon, not even of the dioxide variety
How can you tell it’s a nuclear power plant? Is it by the hyperbolic cooling towers? All thermo-electric power plants, “fired” by coal, natural gas, oil, or nuclear, require cooling towers. I see no reactor containment structures. The coal yard could be on the other side.
And, there are 3 large flue gas stacks in the foreground. Most likely coal.
Story tip
Attack on oil tanker in Red Sea threatens ‘severe ecological disaster’
https://www.ft.com/content/7f886279-fecb-4410-b402-fbf85b9411b1
Where is the green outrage?
But … the Houthis don’t like the US – or the UK or Israel.
Probably not keen on the West as a whole.
So, some of the Greenies [the Watermelons] will accept that the end justifies the means….
Though I have read that the Houthis may be prepared to allow the ship to be salvaged – or the oil..
Very good money for the salvors – danger money etc., over and above Lloyd’s Open Form payments for stopping pollution.
Not my idea of a post-retirement gig, but someone will do it – if the reward is there.
Auto
My German is very poor – does “Die Energiewende” mean death to reliable energy systems?
An infinite amount of money must be spent to save the planet!
(Is a /s needed?)
And you can spend all the money you want trying to change the weather….and more yet on 30 years worth of weather that is defined as “climate”….its just a tax plan to redistribute wealth from the “rich” people with cars to drive and houses to heat… to the “poor” people who are envisioned to have high paying jobs in the solar industry….probably squeegeeing solar panels and the like….
Until humans can control the moon, the sun, orbital mechanics, earth tilt, earth magnetic fields, earth rotation, earth wobble, need I go on, humans can’t control weather and if weather can’t be controlled, neither can climate (30 year weather average) or climate change (long term change in weather patterns).
It is not a plan to perform Robin Hood, who recaptured taxes collect by edict of the Sheriff of Nottingham (per King John edict) and gave them back to the common folk, but rather akin toe Prince John having those taxes collected for himself.
“But while Energiewende slashed pollution…”. Pollution meaning CO2 the gas essential for all life on Earth?
“…resulting in a commendable 25 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2022 compared to 2002. “
The result of a ‘commendable’ reduction in industrial activity as businesses fled Germany, or shut down and Germany’s carbon emissions were outsourced to China – whose emissions, strange to report, keep going up and up.
I reality there was no reduction in carbon emissions, as the overall figures for Germany show
You cant just take the summed renewable output and say that every MWh so generated is ‘carbon neutral’ when it pushes huge extra carbon emissions elsewhere.
Once up and running, nuclear reactors provide reliable, affordable “baseload” power – electricity that’s available all the time.
But Germany’s envirofascists were just too stupid to comprehend that. They ran on hate – in this case for nuclear power. It trumped every other consideration. And with no untermenschen around, what better target for their hate than those big plants? Their Central Committees obviously sang in harmony, commanded from top down ‘abolish the nukes’, fully confident (like so many Americans are) that with enough Wind unt Solar, the grids would obediently deliver electrons to one and all just like their Great Leaders proclaimed.
The long term economics of nuclear are easy to understand here:
https://youtu.be/cbeJIwF1pVY?si=7NGvtTYIe2D9eJ00
It goes like this…
Spot on and many UN officials over the past several decades have publicly stated that.
Except everything they are doing is DESTROYING society and economies and environments around the world.
They are NOT creating a better world in any way whatsoever.
They are destroying energy independence.
They are knocking down rainforest to install wind industrial estates
Wind and solar are totally NON-sustainable
Green jobs.. where are they?.. after destroying industries and causing real jobs to disappear.
They are making cities unliveable and turning them into third world ghettos
They are destroying grid supplies and pushing prices up rapidly with erratic renewables.
They are putifying the water with toxic residues from manufacturing and installation and disposal of useless crap at end-of use, while making the air unliveable for avian wild-life.
They are mutilating the mental health of children with moronic scare tactics, stopping them enjoying the once-great outdoors.
They are not creating a better world for anything.
They’re also knocking down rainforests to grow biofuels
What if it’s a non starter and you waste Hundred$ of Trillion$ for nothing?
Nice Funny cartoon MU. I like it.
All you need to do is scratch the…
…Green Jobs
…Renewables
And you have all that already without wind and solar ruinables
Repeating my comment from yesterday, as it is also relevant to this post:
During WWII there were discussions among the allies about how post-war Germany would be structured. The US State Department floated a plan, known as the Morgenthau Plan to cut Germany into several small countries and to deindustrialize them sending the city folk back to the farms. It looks like Germany is implementing a version of the plan all by itself. I am not sure we should stop them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morgenthau_Plan
Starting in 1933, Germany’s considerable industrial potential was redirected towards fighting another major European war, one set by the Nazis to begin in the late 1930’s.
After Germany’s defeat in WWII, it was recognized that the Soviet Union had designs on Western Europe and that there was no other long-term choice but to maintain West Germany as ally against Soviet Russia.
West Germany once again became an industrial powerhouse and remained one for fifty years after the war. And then after 2000, the greens took control of Germany with the objective of emasculating German psychology and deindustrializing the German economy.
Post-communist Russia won big as one consequence, at least in the energy sector of the European economy.
Is there an argument to be made that France, Poland, and Czechia could make a lot of money by encouraging the Germans to abandon their green ambitions, while supplying the energy the Germans need to resume a fully industrial economy?
ROFL, thankyou.
“But while Energiewende slashed pollution”. CO2 is not a pollutant.
Don’t worry, Germany has done very badly in reducing fertiliser gas output. Pre Biden, with not a green policy in sight, the US achieved bigger fertiliser gas emission reductions by Fracking Gas. Free markets move in mysterious ways.
Governor Kathy Hochul of New York will be hosting a “Future Energy Economy Summit” on September 4th-5th, 2024.
The afternoon session on September 5th will be focusing on nuclear power. I will be watching the Hochul summit from the Middle of Nowhere here in eastern Washingtion State.
My speculations concerning the reasons for this upcoming summit and its focus on nuclear power were previously posted here:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2024/08/27/yet-more-reasons-why-green-hydrogen-is-going-nowhere/#comment-3961275
All of this was intentional. The goal was never a reduction in fossil fuel burning. It was a transformation of the economy from capitalism to bureaucracy.
What I want is a nice compact 1MW nuclear generator in my basement. I could sell the surplus to the neighbors when the wind and the sun fail.
Angela Merkel pandered to Green Party Goons to stay in power, despite having identified the nature of Vladimir Putin.
Germany suffered.
I don’t understand how the Germans could do such an ignorant thing. It makes no sense.
The quote “…resulting in a commendable 25 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2022 compared to 2002. But while Energiewende slashed pollution through building out renewable energy sources…” is so annoying, it is almost offensive. When are these “experts” going to learn, that carbon is a solid, therefore it can no be emitted? It is a carbon dioxide they are talking about, and here is another con, which these “experts” are continuously pushing, trying to convince the public, that we are “polluting” the planet. CO2 is NOT a pollutant!! Every adult person produces on average 1 kg of it per day. It is a plant food, and recent modest increase in CO2 increased yield of agricultural crops, while requiring less water. What is so bad about that? Also CO2 is not controlling the Earth’s temperatures, as so many articles published here on WUWT show. It would be really helpful, if authors of articles like this one would instead point out to readers, how much catastrophic damage to pristine nature do the “renewables” actually cause.
China isn’t bribing them to succeed without emissions, they’re bribing them to (over)commit to “renewables”.
I worked and sometimes lived in Germany from 2000 until 2016, and saw most of these disastrous policies happen. In addition to the immense cost savings identified in this analysis by not building wind/solar but keeping and expanding nuclear, there would’ve been the huge benefit of avoiding despoiling enormous swaths of beautiful countryside. I love Germany and Germans. I hated my last drive from Schwabish Hall to Berlin and staring at hundreds, maybe thousands of “bird grinders” in the otherwise pristine landscape. Heinous. As in the US, this “Energiewende” is driven by the tail of the dog (Green Party and captured politicians), whereas most German technical people I worked with knew this was stupid and damaging. The end goal, of course, is not “fixing” the climate, but de-industrializing and impoverishing the native population.