Germany Gets Dunkelf**ked Again, Norway to Dismantle Power Cables To Europe

From Robert Bryce’s Substack

Another wind drought has led to soaring electricity prices across Europe. Norway, which exports power to its European neighbors, has seen enough.

Robert Bryce

For the second time in a month, Germany’s electric grid has been hit by a wind drought, known in German as a Dunkelflaute. The lack of wind sent Europe’s electricity prices soaring to their highest levels since the end of 2022, when Europe was in the midst of an energy crisis due to concerns about supplies of Russian gas. That’s saying something since Europe — and Germany in particular — now appears to be amid a permanent energy crisis.

Yesterday, German consumers paid an average of $400 per megawatt-hour for electricity. During peak times, prices in Germany’s wholesale power market came close to $1,000 per MWh, the highest level in 18 years. Here’s how a reporter with Spain’s El Pais newspaper explained the situation:

Dunkelflaute is a cursed word in the German electricity sector. The combination, typical of cold anticyclones, of low temperatures (which increase demand) and the almost total absence of wind (which hinders wind generation) configures one of the worst possible scenarios for the price of electricity: it forces the burning of more gas in combined cycle plants, which are much more expensive, and that substantially increases the bill…The main factor behind this escalation is the lack of wind. While at this time of year Germany’s powerful wind power sector (onshore and offshore) usually averages almost 20 gigawatts (GW) of power, according to data from the specialist portal Montel, thus becoming the country’s main source of electricity, on Wednesday it will just exceed 3 GW. With the cloudy skies, solar photovoltaic power is also operating well below its potential and forces combined cycle plants — in which gas is burned to obtain electricity — to operate at a higher rate than usual, driving up prices.

The wind drought isn’t just hitting Germany. As shown in the graphic at the top of this article, electricity prices across Europe soared amid the wind drought. In response, Norwegian politicians are promising to dismantle the undersea power cables that connect Norway’s grid to mainland Europe to protect Norwegians from Europe’s tumultuous electricity market. Electricity prices in Norway, which gets 90% of its power from hydro, hit record prices this week despite having full hydro reservoirs.

This article is free. To get all new posts and comment on articles, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.

According to the X account of Visegrád 24, a Norwegian news outlet, the two links that connect Norway to Europe will reach their technical lifetimes in 2026 and 2027. The two cables have 9 GW of exchange capacity, of which 5.1 GW connects to Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, and the UK. The outlet quoted Norway’s energy minister as saying, “It’s a shitty situation.”

Visegrád 24 also quoted Sweden’s deputy prime minister and energy minister, Ebba Busch, as being “furious with the Germans.” The article continued, explaining that due to Germany’s decision to shutter its nuclear plants, “people in southern Sweden and southern Norway now have [to] pay $5 for a 10-minute shower.”

As seen above, Germany’s wind energy production collapsed three times this week. During each wind lull, the shortfall was made up by gas-fired generation. As I explained last month, during the first Dunkelflaute of the year:

The latest wind drought provides more evidence of the foolishness of Germany’s Energiewende, an insanely expensive effort designed to force the country off of hydrocarbons and onto alt-energy. In September, a study published in the International Journal of Sustainable Energy estimated that between 2002 and 2022, the Energiewende cost Germany $746 billion. Of that sum, more than half was spent on alt-energy production and distribution. The remainder was spent on subsidies. If Germany had spent about half that sum on nuclear energy, it would have achieved greater emissions reductions than it did by chasing the mirage of alt-energy.

Things may be bad, but don’t ever underestimate Germany’s ability to make things even worse.

As I wrote in “Germany Is Dunkelf**ked,” the German government plans to provide an additional $17 billion in subsidies for Germany’s wind sector. Those new payments will be added to existing alt-energy subsidies, which the University of Cologne estimates will cost $19.3 billion in 2025.

Furthermore, on Wednesday, Bloomberg reported that the German government has “dropped plans for a major expansion of gas-fired power plants because of an absence of political support.” The country was aiming to add 5 GW of new capacity in 2025 and another 5 GW by 2028, but the deal couldn’t move forward due to last month’s collapse of the coalition government.

A final note: This morning, I talked to a US energy industry veteran who is currently in Berlin attending an energy conference. I asked about the sentiment in Germany amid the Dunkelflaute. The veteran told me it was so cold in Berlin that he bought an extra hat to stay warm. “It’s super cold, and there’s no wind and no sun.” As for the sentiment at the energy conference, he told me, “German industry is fleeing.”

Media hits

I was recently on the Americano podcast with The Spectator’s Freddy Gray. We talked at length about Chris Wright, energy humanism, and US energy policy. You can listen to that podcast here.

A few days ago, I was on Australia’s ADH TV talking to my friend Gerard Holland about the recent US election and what might happen under the Trump administration. You can watch that episode here.