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Coal and fossil fuel use in Germany at a record low for electricity in 2023
- givemeethekeys 3y agoWait, what? Whatever happened to all the coal fired power plants Germany is going to spin up to keep us all warm and toasty?
- drewcon 3y agoYeah I have the same question. My understanding is they had to bring more coal online to offset shutting down nuclear. What gives?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- blkhawk 3y agowell.. its actually a bit more complex than that. The TLDR is that the slack of nuclear was picked up by renewables (mostly wind). the slightly more complicated reason is that wind often was kept off in favor of non-throttle-able base-loads like coal and nuclear. Now with the latter out of the picture the slack has to be taken up my either expensive NGAS or wind. NGAS can be throttled somewhat quickly so if there is wind its now used. This suddenly reveals the true capacities that were there all along.
- mahkeiro 3y agoNot sure I get your point in 2019 Germany was producing 123.6TWh of wind energy in 2023 it's 139.8 TWh. Yes it's increasing but it doesn't even start to compensate the total that went from 522TWh to 436TWh. And the wind production capacity increased at the same time from 62GW to 69GW during the same time interval.
- pvorb 3y agoA huge problem with the German coal phase-out by 2038 ("ideally by 2030") is that the law doesn't prohibit exporting coal. So with every coal plant that's shut down, coal becomes cheaper and will be burned by someone else. We're doomed.
- cronix 3y ago> China permitted more coal power plants last year than any time in the last seven years, according to a new report released this week. It's the equivalent of about two new coal power plants per week. The report by energy data organizations Global Energy Monitor and the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air finds the country quadrupled the amount of new coal power approvals in 2022 compared to 2021. > That's despite the fact that much of the world is getting off coal, says Flora Champenois, coal research analyst at Global Energy Monitor and one of the co-authors of the report. > "Everybody else is moving away from coal and China seems to be stepping on the gas," she says. "We saw that China has six times as much plants starting construction as the rest of the world combined." https://www.npr.org/2023/03/02/1160441919/china-is-building-six-times-more-new-coal-plants-than-other-countries-report-fin https://www.npr.org/2023/03/02/1160441919/china-is-building-...
- ViewTrick1002 3y agoChina is also building enough renewable power than their grid expansion rate leading to a structural decline in CO2 emissions. At the same time the utilization factors of the coal plants reduce each year. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/nov/13/chinas-carbon-emissions-set-for-structural-decline-from-next-year https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/nov/13/chinas-carb...
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- TheLoafOfBread 3y agoThey are not accounted for when they are not supplying electricity thus the headline. But they are still running in idle mode, consuming coal.
- ZeroGravitas 3y agoCould still be better. Having the same level of CO2e per GWh over the last 12 months as the USA is kind of embarrassing for an EU member state. https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/DE https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/DE https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/US https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/US (You need to set the time period to last 12 months, not sure if you can encode that into the URL)
- onlyrealcuzzo 3y agoThey phased on nuclear too early - other than that they're RAPIDLY moving in the right direction, as is the US.
- kgabis 3y agoThe fact that they phased out nuclear at all is astonishing and definitely not a move in the right direction. Politics and radiophobia won.
- thiago_fm 3y agoIt isn't a fair comparison as Germany has terrible geography in comparison to the US for energy generation, and certain energy sources like hydropower are very efficient, but not possible to replicate given the environmental impact. Hell, even solar generation in Germany isn't anywhere as good as the US, where it can build solar parks in the south, meanwhile most of Germany has what, 6 hours of daylight during winter? To me, it's absurd that the US has literally the best geography of any country in the world and yet isn't coal-free. It has even a river that divides the country. It's almost as if it was hand-drawn by god. With mountainy regions, hot and cold areas, deserts and tropical areas, America you have no excuse and can do better.
- whatshisface 3y agoThe US also has got enormous and inexhaustible (all together) coal mines, and oil fields of course. The price of natural gas is negative in some parts of Texas.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- yongjik 3y agoAnd by "record low", we mean "nearly six times that of neighboring France." Compare: https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&c=FR&interval=year&year=2023 https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&...
- kleiba 3y agoUnsurprising, given the countries' opposing views on nuclear power.
- kleiba 3y agoHowever, in 2023, Germany has for the first time produced most of its electrical power (52%) from renewable energy sources [1]. [1] https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/germanys-2023-renewable-power-installations-hit-record-wind-sector-lags-2024-01-02/ https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/germanys-2023-renewa...
- toomuchtodo 3y agoCurrently at 80GW of solar and 66GW of wind with a goal of 215GW cumulative solar capacity by 2030. Roughly speaking, they’ll have over 300GW of wind and solar by the end of the decade assuming at least another 20GW of wind gets built. For comparison, this is five times more than all existing French nuclear generation capacity (61GW), and does not include hydro, pumped hydro, batteries, and interconnectors. So the whole nuclear argument is frankly silly. This will be done before even a few GWs of nuclear were to come online. https://www.pv-magazine.com/2023/11/22/germanys-january-october-solar-capacity-additions-hit-11-7-gw/ https://www.pv-magazine.com/2023/11/22/germanys-january-octo...
- kgabis 3y agoCapacity is not generation.
- toomuchtodo 3y ago
- cheriot 3y agoSeems like a misleading headline. Total energy used is at a record low: https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&c=DE&interval=year&year=-1&source=public https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&... Much of the decline came from gas, presumably because they stopped buying so much from Russia.
- darknoon 3y agoIt's striking vs the France chart, though I wonder how this reflects electricity import / exports https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&c=FR&interval=year&year=-1&source=total https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&...
- pvorb 3y agoAnd because of the mild weather in the winter season 2022-2023. Also, private households are saving on energy as much as they can because of high prices.
- qayxc 3y agoPlease explain how the winter temps affect electricity use. Heating only accounts for 4% of household heating sources in Germany [1]. [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1189752/household-heating-sources-germany/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1189752/household-heatin...
- thiago_fm 3y agoGermany is killing it. Since I've moved here I've been following renewable energy numbers and also what the government commits to, and it's incredible how they've managed to meet consistently the solar and wind generation goals. Unfortunately, they haven't been able to meet other goals such as amount of housing built etc. But coming from a third-world country where I wouldn't trust any kind of plans coming from the government, it's really surprising to me. To achieve this, in a bureaucratic country like Germany, they need to align many stars like building permits, subsidies, companies that can navigate the system, capital. Yet, they still manage to do it.
- pvorb 3y agoAnd that's in a current political situation with three parties in the government that disagree all the time. Imagine what could be done in more stable times! The huge issue I see is that they fail to implement enough social balancing, which leads to more and more people voting for the extreme right wing party AfD, which will cause a lot of trouble after the next elections.
- thiago_fm 3y agoPolitics in a democratic regime end up reflecting the desire of the people, if somebody is to blame for this mess are the voters themselves. This situation makes AFD temporarily strong, but also gives space to other parties to perhaps say yes again to atomic energy and other non-conventional ideas. Also brings more power to CDU and other parties that resembles more stability. Politics is a self-balancing system, it's not so useful to care about it.
- pvorb 3y agoI'd agree if only we had more time to solve the upcoming challenges. But currently it looks like no one's going to be strong enough to do the right things. Four years are a lot of (wasted) time in the short period we have left.
- nforgerit 3y agoGerman here. German middle class considers the current political situation (across all federal layers) the least trustworthy in at least 30-50 years. The majority of the people is frustrated AF because of government paralysis for no real reasons but political gambling. It's that bad that >90% of my friends and acquaintances chose to not read the news anymore and go with ignorance and escapism. Germany seems to be going through some kind of identity crisis right now (we lack most competencies for 21st century and used to cover all problems with money and arrogance) and chances are not that low we'll end up with far right leadership. (The only good thing is that the German army is that much underfunded and bureaucratic that a military coup is impossible. /s)
- treprinum 3y ago...and that's all because they take electricity from Czech Republic and France, leading to increased prices there. It's like with being green by dumping trash to Poland which regularly lets it burn in the open. "Solutions"
- qayxc 3y agoSources please. The trade was pretty even between Germany and France as well as between the Czech Republic and Germany [1] The significant imports came from Denmark. [1] https://energy-charts.info/charts/import_export/chart.htm?l=de&c=DE&year=2023 https://energy-charts.info/charts/import_export/chart.htm?l=...
- locallost 3y agoThanks. The irony of that comment is that prices in Europe last year skyrocketed because of the failure of French nuclear. All of the neighboring countries were stuck with the bill of that failure.
- mahkeiro 3y agoOh really? it had nothing to do with the price of the LNG that went through the roof because of the war in Ukraine and the fact that electricity price are governed by the price of the last capacity called (LNG plants)?
- locallost 3y agoIt was one part of it. The second part of it is the supply was heavily constrained. Countries around France (e.g. Italy and in some parts of the year Switzerland etc.) depended on that electricity too. So when it was gone it really screwed everything up. You are correct that gas is the highest priced and sets the price of all electricity, but it simply wouldn't have been used as much if french nuclear hadn't failed. That's how merit order works.
- derriz 3y ago
- cl0ckt0wer 3y agoThe document says "generation". I though Germany imported a lot of their electricity. I can't tell if these numbers include the source of the imported power.
- darknoon 3y agoInteresting context I would like to know
- ZeroGravitas 3y agoGermany had been a net electricity exporter for the last 2 decades. I'm assuming that's still the case for last year or it would be bigger news. I did see one article fretting that they might turn into a net importer later in the decade.
- nomonnai 3y agoNo, Germany has been a net importer in 2023. Whereas in 2022, 27.5 TWh were exported, in 2023, 8.6 TWh had to be imported. The summer was particularly disastrous, with 5.5 TWh imported in August alone. Germany consumed 483 TWh in 2022 and 457 TWh in 2023. Image of net export (2023) by month: https://ibb.co/jDkg9sF https://ibb.co/jDkg9sF. You can query and visualize these data on the official site of the Bundesnetzagentur (Federal Network Agency): https://www.smard.de/home/marktdaten https://www.smard.de/home/marktdaten. It's a capable tool, you should check it out. Once using it I realized that news reports cannot replace looking at the time series data.
- locallost 3y agoGermany has around 80GW of capacity in fossil fuel plants so it can generate pretty much all of its electricity from that alone. The reasons it doesn't are: 1) it's cheaper to use excess wind and solar from neighbouring countries which is the vast majority of its imports. Prices in Germany have gone down dramatically since the nuclear shutdown 2) it's better for the environment So it's basically a win win and far away from disastrous. What is disastrous is when a quarter of your nuclear fleet goes offline unexpectedly and you need to import electricity in the middle of the biggest energy crisis of the last 50 years. And you need to nationalize the electricity company because it made a hole of 20 billion in a single year.
- drchaos 3y agoTechnically true, but still misleading, as the total production has gone down significantly: 2022: 491,8 TWh 2023: 436,8 TWh So Germany is not replacing fossil fuels with renewables, it just produces less electricity overall. Which might be caused by the fact that electricity is so expensive nowadays, that especially energy-intensive industries are getting less and less economical, so they lower their production or even shut down completely and move elsewhere.
- ViewTrick1002 3y agoHow much of the production in 2023 were to prop up France's ailing nuclear plants? https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/15/business/nuclear-power-france.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/15/business/nuclear-power-fr...
- locallost 3y agoIn 2023 nothing because the plants are back online, but last year a lot. Although Germany does traditionally export electricity to France in the winter because France doesn't have enough to cover electrical heating. Not sure what happened this winter.
- mahkeiro 3y agoFrench wind production is covering the needs currently. During end of December French production was mostly wind + nuclear.
- locallost 3y agoThat's great to hear. Energy-charts has data to 2014, and until last winter Germany exported more to France in every winter month except one, I think February 2022 or something.
- locallost 3y agoTotal production went down 12% and fossil fuel production went down 22%. So even in that sense fossil fuels are replaced with renewables. The energy intensive industries that are affected mostly use natural gas. Energy prices for both gas and electricity have reduced significantly this year.
- anonymouscaller 3y agoWhat is the difference between "waste renewable" and "waste non-renewable"?
- pvorb 3y agoI think it's differentiating waste that is burned in two categories: food and plant-based waste, which is renewable, and everything else that comes from non-renewable sources. But that's only a guess because those are typically the categories for waste separation in Germany.
- cpr 3y agoYes, and Germany is in steep industrial decline...
- legitster 3y agoThis is really misleading. They already have one of the largest "green" investments in the world and are still only getting pennies on the dollar back for it (Germany is not particularly sunny nor windy). They still use massive amounts of coal compared to neighbors and the coal they use is lignite (aka Brown Coal aka the worst kind). The only real change has been reducing overall electrical generation because of the shutting off of natural gas. A situation Germany is only in because of their steadfast refusal to adopt nuclear energy like their neighbors.