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Germany Achieves Record 57.7% Renewable Energy Share for First Half of 2023
- jamil7 3y agoCan't wait for the 150 smug comments saying "But they shut down nuclear power".
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- newyankee 3y agoI think renewable energy disruption is happening faster than many can fathom. A few breakthroughs in storage technology and things might actually turn into optimism from Climate fears in 1 or 2 decades. Hopefully entrenched interests do not let free market disrupt them this time.
- anonzzzies 3y agoIf everyone plays ball. That we will need to see. China, USA, India also need to go in hard.
- senttoschool 3y agoDoesn't China already lead in many areas of renewables including wind and solar deployments and manufacturing? https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/china-widens-renewable-energy-supply-lead-with-wind-power-push-2023-03-01 https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/china-widens-ren... China also supplies the bulk of Germany's solar panel demands.
- _ph_ 3y agoActually China seems to be ahead of their own plans and Chinese emissions might peak in 24 and decline from that point on as they are rolling out renewables at an astonishing pace.
- detourdog 3y agoI believe some of the acceleration maybe due to local generation decreasing distribution losses and the summer PV generation decreasing peaker plant ramp ups. I think those are subtitles are hard to judge and most likely downplayed by incumbents.
- mutlimind 3y agoIn the past 2 decades Germany has blown hundreds of billions of dollars into renewable energy. Now we have the highest electricity price in the world. It is all socialism. Zero market :-(
- ragebol 3y agoThe price is determined by the most expensive generator. Without renewables, prices would have been even higher
- Aachen 3y ago> Now we have the highest electricity price in the world. Imagine what that price would have been if the renewables hadn't been there and they bought only "green" gas plants instead. Or "green" nuclear, but we don't talk about that in Germany anymore
- looping__lui 3y agoOh, but you are aware that we need to DOUBLE our installed capacity for gas by 2030 in order to be able to manage our electricity grid towards renewables, right? Page 25: https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/content/dam/ise/de/documents/publications/studies/Fraunhofer-ISE-Studie-Wege-zu-einem-klimaneutralen-Energiesystem.pdf https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/content/dam/ise/de/documents/p...
- iSnow 3y agoNowhere on p 25 can I find this. Maybe you mean p 27, and I don't get what argument you are trying to make. Yes, there would be more gas capacity, but for green gas.
- looping__lui 3y ago“Green gas”. You mean Biogas? That isn’t really an option: https://www.capital.de/amp/wirtschaft-politik/kann-biogas-russisches-gas-ersetzen--32667834.html https://www.capital.de/amp/wirtschaft-politik/kann-biogas-ru...
- looping__lui 3y agoBit not in the way people would anticipate. According to the modeling of the Fraunhofer (base assumption), we will need to double our capacity from gas (yay), double renewables to eventually achieve twice the carbon footprint of France by 2030. The base load is so high in Germany and renewables are so unreliable, that we need >100% installed capacity from “conventional” sources. The storage and “smart grid” is not really feasible or likely to happen imho. More info: https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/content/dam/ise/de/documents/publications/studies/Fraunhofer-ISE-Studie-Wege-zu-einem-klimaneutralen-Energiesystem.pdf https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/content/dam/ise/de/documents/p... Disclaimer: I have PV, use ground heat in my house; I’m totally pro zero emission but Germany’s ideological decision making makes it impossible whilst pumping up prices beyond affordable.
- Tade0 3y ago> we need >100% installed capacity from “conventional” sources. You already need that really. A grid going at 70% generation capacity is already considered overloaded.
- looping__lui 3y agoI’m talking about non-renewables. I think (and I might be wrong, but the ballpark should be right), we will have 600% capacity installed in renewables and 100-150% installed in conventional capacity by 2030. So shifting to renewables means like 700+% installer capacity, which means that when sun shines and wind blows, you will only be able to use 1/7 of the electricity produced during the day whilst also potentially running the gas turbines full steam at night. We have observed this a lot this year in Germany (e.g. wind was taken off grid because solar produced too much whilst gas and coal only delivered a minimal (?) operational load).
- iSnow 3y ago>we will need to double our capacity from gas (yay) Notably, green gas, not fossil gas. You can call that conventional, but it's not adding CO2 emissions. According to their study, the CO2 factor would fall from 460g/kWh in 2020 to 150 in 2030 and between 3 and 9 in 2050. You can't just go "meh, twice as much as France" and ignore that the scenario starts at 15x France.
- Tade0 3y ago> Hopefully entrenched interests do not let free market disrupt them this time. Too late for that and not for a lack of trying. The IEA has been consistently, hilariously wrong regarding solar growth for almost two decades: https://zenmo.com/en/photovoltaic-growth-reality-versus-projections-of-the-international-energy-agency-with-2018-update-2/ https://zenmo.com/en/photovoltaic-growth-reality-versus-proj... Meanwhile a prototype 15MW turbine is already producing power: https://www.offshorewind.biz/2022/12/30/vestas-15-mw-prototype-turbine-produces-first-power/ https://www.offshorewind.biz/2022/12/30/vestas-15-mw-prototy...
- zelphirkalt 3y agoI think people can fathom a lot and demand as much. Even if the renewable energy transition happens faster than we think, we are still a decade or so late. It cannot happen quickly enough at this point.
- Garvi 3y agoActually Germany recently shut down all of it's nuclear plants and replaced them with the dirtiest fuel possible: lignite coal burning plants. Statistics are a peculiar thing.
- sirwitti 3y agoDo you have a source for that?
- littlecranky67 3y agohttps://www.reuters.com/business/energy/germany-extends-run-times-coal-fired-power-plants-boost-supply-2022-09-28/ https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/germany-extends-run-...
- ejb999 3y agohttps://www.cnn.com/2023/04/15/europe/germany-nuclear-phase-out-climate-intl/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/15/europe/germany-nuclear-phase-...
- ChuckNorris89 3y agoA source for a piece of popular news that was covered by every single media out there and is only a quick google search away? https://www.google.com/search?q=germnay+nuclear+lignite https://www.google.com/search?q=germnay+nuclear+lignite I swear, sometimes HN users can be so pedantic, they'll demand source that the earth is round or that the water is wet. I used to be afraid that ChatGPT would make our jobs redundant, but seeing how people can't find basic info by themselves and need to ask humans to spoon feed them, I think I can breathe easily that our jobs are safe.
- sgbeal 3y ago> I swear, sometimes HN users can be so pedantic, they'll ask for the source that the earth is round or that the water is wet. Without a citation, any statement of ostensible fact is just unfounded rumor.
- mutlimind 3y agoThe deindustrialization has begun.
- Timon3 3y agoWhat makes you say that?
- 29_29 3y agohttps://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/feb/24/basf-cut-jobs-energy-crisis-germany-recession https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/feb/24/basf-cut-jo...
- 29_29 3y agohttps://www.economist.com/business/2022/09/11/germany-faces-a-looming-threat-of-deindustrialisation https://www.economist.com/business/2022/09/11/germany-faces-...
- 29_29 3y agohttps://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/germany-strong-indicators-mask-loss-of-competitiveness-by-dalia-marin-2023-02 https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/germany-strong-...
- senttoschool 3y agoThis just seems like anti-China propaganda, no? The first half of the article blames the Ukraine war. The second half of the article blames China for being more competitive.
- Timon3 3y ago"German Deindustrialization Is Still Looming" - so it hasn't actually begun?
- ltzny10 3y agoArticles like that one and many others: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-06-12/germany-warns-of-industry-shutdown-if-russian-gas-stops-flowing https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-06-12/germany-w...
- nbuet 3y ago... and yet Germany looks awful on https://app.electricitymaps.com/map https://app.electricitymaps.com/map . Is that a measurement problem, or something else that we should know?
- luto 3y agoBurning lots of coal does that.
- silvester23 3y agoI guess that's because most of the non-renewable electricity is generated with lignite so even with the 85% renewables generation the map shows at this moment, there are still significant CO2 emissions.
- skrause 3y agoOn this map Germany always looks bad until you zoom out enough to see the USA.
- ffgjgf1 3y ago> it's mostly Americans pointing That’s such a random claim to make…
- llampx 3y agoAt least the US has cheap energy. Germany has high taxes, high energy prices and still manages to be dirty while being morally arrogant.
- skrause 3y agoI don't see Germany to be morally arrogant here, they're fully aware that there are problems with the transition to renewables.
- Archelaos 3y agoFor a fair judgement one must look at the bigger picture for example by looking at the CO2 emissions in general per capita. The latest data I could find is of 2021.[1] Germany is 8.09t, while Australia is 15.09t, USA is 14.86t, Canada is 14.30t. Germany is not so far away from countries which are very "green" on the map you linked, such as Iceland (9.11t -- more than Germany!) Norway (7.57t), Austria (7.24t) and Finland (6.79t). This is only an example. Also CO2 emissions per capita does not provide us with a complete picture. (For example, if a country emits CO2 in the production of export goods, to what extent should the emissions actually be attributed to the importing countries?) By phasing out nuclear energy, Germany has made a major contribution to environmental protection. However, since this is a completely different category of environmental protection, it cannot objectively be offset against presumably associated CO2 emissions. In an open democratic society, such considerations are therefore not the task of a technical elite, but of the people as a whole. As an individual, of course, one can always take a different view of such majority opinions on the matter and campaign for them to be revised. However, one should always be aware that the weighing of such alternatives is fundamentally opinionated. [1] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co2-per-capita-marimekko?tab=table https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co2-per-capita-marimekko?...
- Aachen 3y agoElectricity, maybe. Energy? I wish. This headline would be more true if we had transportation fully electrified and all buildings heated with heat pumps, but last I heard the proposed law to require the latter transition to be started in 2024 was dropped again, and they're also still debating about starting to require transitioning the combustion engine fleets to electric by, what was it, 2030? I also still see stickers here, calling for the closure of a nuclear plant in Belgium. These people live near one of the biggest coal mines and power plants, but tihange is what scares them. Looks like we'll have to dig in our own pockets if we want to be part of the solution, government isn't going to do it, even in a principalistic country as Germany. We'll get to +3°C or something but at least you can tell the kids of 2060 that you at least did what you could...
- a_bonobo 3y ago[flagged]
- Aachen 3y agoMaybe this is my tech bubble, but try to find a country with higher Linux/PGP/OpenStreetMap use. I am still trying to put my finger on what the culture difference is precisely, but also outside of tech there's more thinking about what the right/correct/fair thing to do is, even if that brings greater net harm in the end. Example: closing down nuclear because it's not a perfect solution and has risks and waste (ignoring their proportions), in favor of renewables, not caring that renewables are decades away and it'll be replaced by maintaining coal for more years than it takes the world to trip a couple (predicted/expected) points of no return in climate change. By comparison, I found the Netherlands to be much more yolo. Live and let live, don't care as much if what they're doing is correct All generalisations, of course. You can find nazis and climate activists in the Netherlands as well as in Germany or anywhere else.
- iSnow 3y agoWith all due respect, renewables are not decades away, they are at a major inflection point right now. While I deplore the shuttering of Germany's NPPs, nuclear would not have been a solution to the decarbonization challenge, as the times to build NPPs and the costs are prohibitive. Renewables are the cheapest source of energy right here and now, we should invest way more into researching grid-scale storage solutions. Also not so sure about NL being more relaxed, they have a cultural war at their hands over nitrogen emissions from agriculture, and it has shaken up their political system.
- mhandley 3y agoRight now, Germany appears to be 85% renewable [0], but is still pretty mediocre on CO2 emissions compared to many of its neighbours (Poland excepted!). That 8GW of coal still hurts, but the trend is pretty good. [0] https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/DE https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/DE
- sparkling 3y agoBecause electricity is only one part of the overall energy usage. Heating is still ~75% fossil-based (oil, gas).
- mhandley 3y agoYes, but there's little point in electrifying heating until you have a cleaner grid. Right now, the marginal source of power in Germany is coal and in the UK is mostly gas (occasionally coal). If you switch your heating to electric heating, that's how the electricity would be generated. With gas as the marginal source, if you switch from a modern condensing gas boiler to an air-source heat pump with a COP of 2.5, you might come out a little ahead in CO2 emmisions once you factor in generation (50% thermal efficiency) and transmission (9% losses for the UK) losses, but not a lot. With coal as the marginal source, you come out behind in CO2 emissions from switching from gas heating to a heat pump. If you switched from gas to resistive heating, it's a lose all round.
- sofixa 3y ago> but there's little point in electrifying heating until you have a cleaner grid That's not true. Both endeavours are long - if you wait to start electrifying heating until the grid is fully decarbonised, you'll be waiting for a decade before starting another decade-long thing. If both are done in parallel it sill, of course, be much faster.
- mhandley 3y agoI guess you're talking about as a country. But as an individual in the UK, I'm better to wait. Switching now doesn't help CO2 emissions and sometimes hurts, prices will likely be lower in future as production scales up, I can invest the money in the meantime, and I can get a brand new heat pump at the point it actually does help. Instead I've focussed now on better insulation.
- ltzny10 3y agoRetail prices still seem at a record 40c/kwh or more. Perhaps tolerable with a C4 professor Fraunhofer salary, adjusted for inflation (unlike the salaries of the plebs).
- passwordoops 3y agoFor all the issues I take living in Quebec I look at my 0.07 CAD/kWh and it reminds me this place does have some advantages
- hdivider 3y agoInteresting. So what are the disadvantages of living in Quebec? (Never been there.)
- volkl48 3y agoIf you don't speak fluent French and want to live there (as a tourist is fine, although outside MTL + Quebec City, English proficiency by the residents should not be assumed), your government dislikes you and is generally trying to make your life harder in as many ways as it can think of. I would expect that to continue getting worse. On the HN/startup crowd note, that includes mandates that business in the office be generally conducted in French if you have 25+ employees, and there's significant enforcement powers to those mandates now. Beyond that, the economy has lagged that of other provinces over past decades, although in recent years that's been less true - remains to be seen if that performance is a break with the long-term trends or not. ----- More subjective: It's generally going to be the "big government" model. Highest taxes on high earners in Canada, generally a reputation for more social services, more regulations. Climate's pretty rough to many, although not extreme by Canadian standards. Still, it's a big difference from Southern Ontario or Vancouver. Montreal is basically the only major "world" city, Quebec City is about the only other one of some national/international significance. While it may look big on a map or as a number, in reality nearly the entire population lives in a relatively small corridor and much of the land area of the province is virtually uninhabited and in many cases basically inaccessible short of a helicopter or serious wilderness expedition. It will not feel anything like being 4x the size of Germany even if it technically is, for an example. ----- Anyway, the power is cheap because it all comes from large hydro plants up north, they're blessed by geography in that sense.
- thiago_fm 3y agoLiving in Germany is leaving any big city and seeing loads of wind turbines everywhere. I know very little of its economics, like that it typically takes 7 years to pay it back and lasts 20-25 years, but looks like a good way to generate renewable energy and will likely soon take Germany to 100%. It's a goal for the government and for many years it has been pushing forward. I dislike many things here, but I can't say I don't admire the country's ability to execute on this and other subjects. I really don't get why the US and other strong countries don't invest as much on it. There is some environmental impact(birds etc) and downsides, but overall looks like one of the best ways to generate energy until we have fusion energy. Also creates many jobs.
- ur-whale 3y ago> seeing loads of wind turbines everywhere The wind turbines are only there to hide the giant, coal-powered power plants that Germany had to restart because the tree-huggers who run that country decided to ditch nuclear. I very much doubt the veracity of this article.
- Pesthuf 3y agoAh yes, notorious tree-hugger Merkel in 2011.
- llampx 3y agoMerkel had no strongly held positions, that much we all know.
- ffgjgf1 3y agoAll kind of idiot (objectively) environmentalists were fighting against nuclear for decades in Germany and other countries. They weren’t the only factor but nuclear was already effectively dead by 2011 in Germany.
- thiago_fm 3y agoDitching nuclear doesn't make wind less important for Germany. I also do hope that this situation also changes, nuclear > coal. I don't doubt the veracity of the article. We've been seeing similar and growing numbers for years. I don't get the hate to wind and how energy generation can easily become a political subject.
- LovinFossilFuel 3y ago[flagged]
- Scharkenberg 3y agoElectricity bill? Electricity prices did not increase in April. They peaked last year and have been falling this year. You are welcome.
- DeathArrow 3y agoWell, dying from cold and hunger is better than dying from pollution, they say. Meanwhile, people pushing for wind, solar and electric cars can make some fortunes. :)
- iLoveOncall 3y agoGermany should be shamed when it comes to green energy. They actively lobbied to make nuclear energy be excluded from green energies, and they have shut down their nuclear power plants to replace them by coal powered plants.
- JanSt 3y agoGermany also produced a multi year net electricity generation low in June. The rise mostly results from this reduction because of the nuclear phase out. These are not the actual numbers but an example: June 2022: renewables 15TWh, total 40TWh = 37.5% June 2023: renewables 15TWh, total 30TWh = 50%
- iSnow 3y agoDestatis claims the reason is that demand was measurably lower than 2022: https://www.destatis.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/2023/06/PD23_220_43312.html https://www.destatis.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/2023/06...
- JanSt 3y agoThe reason does not really matter for the math. The record is due to lower production and not a rapid build-up of renewable energy production.
- iSnow 3y agoIt matters a lot. First, if demand is not there, installed capacity isn't fully utilized. Since production costs of existing renewable installations is lower than carbon-based plants, a lull in demand will automatically increase the renewable percentage, that's neither good nor bad. But in fact, installed capacity is rising: https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/bild/installierte-leistung-zur-stromerzeugung-aus-2 https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/bild/installierte-leistung-zu..., so no, the record is not only due to lower production. Second, until 2022, renewables were actively hindered by the various Merkel cabinets. The roadmap going forward is way more aggressive, but of course planning takes some time. So a "rapid build-up" is still a multi-year thing.
- JanSt 3y agoI did not claim it is only to lower production - it's mainly due to it. Which is exactly my point. Renewables were not actively hindered, Germany just decided to stop paying 30-50 cent per kwh in subsidies because it's stupid. Also, this is a seperate discussion.
- cubefox 3y agoGrams of CO2 per kWh: France: 43 Germany: 398 https://abload.de/img/img_20230705_133511_84efdp.jpg https://abload.de/img/img_20230705_133511_84efdp.jpg The reason? Germans hate nuclear and prefer coal as a stable energy source.
- JanSt 3y agoMost of the population changed their mind and is pro-nuclear. But sadly the only party really supporting nuclear energy is the AfD, which is a far-right party most would never consider to vote for. Nuclear phase-out is part of the Green party identity; the CDU had Merkel going against nuclear after Fukushima and can't really go back, the FDP agreed, the SPD is also against it.
- kataklasm 3y agoI'm afraid you're not realizing the impact of your echo chamber. The bulk of german voting power lies in the age group of 40 to 70, measured by voter turnout per age group. People aged 45 and up felt the imoact of the Chernobyl disaster, whole forests in Germany are still not allowed to be foraged for mushrooms because of ground contamination. Those people have their fear of nuclear power ingrained in them and as usual there's not a lot you can do to convince them. As such "Most of the population changed their mind and is pro nuclear." is definitely not true, at least not right now and I doubt it will ever change. And as we've seen recently in the state of Thuringia, AFD has garnered the top with 35%, that's far from "most people would never consider to vote for".
- oaiey 3y agoI certainly remember my father digging the earth of our fruit garden aside half a year after the fallout of Chernobyl. Things added to perspective.
- JanSt 3y agoIt's not an echo chamber but statistics: https://www.tech-for-future.de/atomkraft-umfrage/#Wie_viel_Prozent_der_Deutschen_sind_fuer_Atomkraft https://www.tech-for-future.de/atomkraft-umfrage/#Wie_viel_P...
- gpjanik 3y agoRevisit this in December, please. This headline is a problem, not an achievement. The amplitude in output of renewables in good vs. bad weather makes it impossible to install photovoltaic panels in many places already now. But yeah, Germany is handsome and awesome.
- roenxi 3y agoGermany's energy consumption per capita has dropped about 20% since its 1980s peak and has been trending down fairly sharply since 2007 [0]. AfD is polling extremely well on the back of a "stop this madness" environmental platform. German renewable energy policies have been a failure at securing human prosperity. [0] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-energy-use?tab=chart&country=DEU https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-energy-use?tab...
- WA 3y ago> German renewable energy policies have been a failure at securing human prosperity. Bullshit. That chart looks the same for many developed nations. A strong downtrend. Just a few examples: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-energy-use?tab=chart&facet=none&country=US~USA~DEU~SWE~FRA~CHE~JPN https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-energy-use?tab...
- maigret 3y agoSome people have a hard time understanding the concept of efficiency.
- roenxi 3y agoOrder of magnitude, what specific efficiencies do you think are causing this? because I think that is just completely silly. Efficiencies will trigger Jevons' paradox and result in energy use rising. What we're seeing in these graphs is a squeeze as Asian nations outcomplete the developed countries combined with a series of policy failures in the West as we choke out our own energy and industrial bases.
- maigret 3y ago> what specific efficiencies do you think are causing this Depends of the place... Improvements in computers & electronics (new TV uses less than half what the old one used 10 y ago), new transportation technologies, better building insulation, diminishing meat consumption... The high energy prices and regulations are two good pushers on that. > Efficiencies will trigger Jevons' paradox and result in energy use rising Only when the prices follow the efficiency. Also, this statement has not applied for electricity in the EU for the last 20 years despite plenty of growth https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Electricity_production,_consumption_and_market_overview https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php... Overall, how do you propose to fight climate change in the coming 5 to 10 years?
- ambyra 3y agoGermany is “green” same as California: high air pollution with most energy imports of any state in the nation. Blood diamond economics applied to energy. I predict that France will become an international leader in nuclear energy, while Germany will kill the most birds.
- tnbp 3y agoGermany is a net exporter of electricity, and has been for over 20 years. Last year, France actually had to import electricity because their NPPs kept failing (too much heat, too little rain, no water to act as coolant).
- gpjanik 3y agoGermany is exporter of electricity and importer of the fossils it burns to make it... Brilliant...
- misja111 3y agoLol. If I'm reading the article properly, renewable energy production actually went -down- in 2023 compared to 2022: 97TW compared to 99TW one year earlier. But: non-renewable energy production in GE went down even more, due to, amongst others, the shutdown of nuclear plants. Did GE then start consume so much less energy compared to 2022? No it did not. GE -produced- less energy, in particular less non-renewable energy. But to compensate, it imported more energy. And all this imported energy was non renewable; much of it was LPG that was imported from oversea.
- JackSlateur 3y agoFunny propaganda We are at the peak of solar energy And every night, germany imports electricity The data from january 2023 is really funny, too
- meerita 3y agoIt's just a distraction from their real problems.
- zerof1l 3y agoAnd Germany also achieved having one of the highest electricity prices in the EU
- KingOfCoders 3y agoSadly we're far behind EV market penetration. If all cars in Germany would be EVs, we could store 2 days of electricity consumption.
- Lolaccount 3y agoCongratulations, Germany. No doubt the entire discussion on HN will be about nuclear.
- haizhung 3y agoIt’s like some sort of reflex when there is „Germany“ and „energy“ in the title …
- amai 3y agoThe price of electricity has been falling in Germany since the beginning of the year, the share of renewable energies in the electricity supply has risen to 65%. The level of gas storage is 20% higher than in recent years, even though there is no more gas flowing from Russia. Nevertheless, the price of gas and heating oil is falling in Germany. It seems to me that the catastrophic news regarding energy blackout etc. in Germany of the last year were slightly exaggerated. https://www.zeit.de/wirtschaft/energiemonitor-deutschland-gaspreis-spritpreis-energieversorgung https://www.zeit.de/wirtschaft/energiemonitor-deutschland-ga...
- therealdrag0 3y agoHow much of that is annual fluctuations because they get more solar in the summer?
- nojvek 3y agoPorche, Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Volkswagen. They are the German darlings. Hard to shake them to move to full electric since they are knee deep invested in ICE engines. Germany also shot themselves in foot by shutting down all nuclear plants and started burning coal.
- dahwolf 3y agoInteresting development announced in the Netherlands last week. We're going to create massive hydrogen infrastructure where we produce it from sea water of the North Sea and then transport it inland using a pipe system to reach a low number of mega hubs, where high energy industry will plug in. Included will be some pipes crossing the border, surely into Germany. On top of this, our king went to Portugal to secure massive deals with Portugal. Apparently it's easier/cheaper to produce Hydrogen in the Mediterranean. Some of it will be produced there and then shipped to Rotterdam, and then fed into the pipes. We're the gods of big infra and also very cheap, so you can be sure that this is going to work.