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Germany Records Historic 12B KWh Solar Feed-In in July 2026
- indiantrains 2mo ago[flagged]
- bcjdjsndon 2mo agoClimate change has come through for us once again
- Aldipower 2mo agoBut it is (should be) cheap to power the AC now.
- tonyedgecombe 2mo agoThat reminds me of my friend who wants to fly around the world to see the Great Barrier Reef before it's gone.
- tfourb 2mo agoNot exactly the same. Buildout of the grid in Germany lacks behind buildout of renewable capacity. Thus, when we have strong winds or a lot of sun, a lot of renewable production actually gets blocked at the source and/or the price of electricity goes to 0 or even negative (though you still pay taxes, so for the conumser, usage isn't free even with dynamic tariffs). In these scenarios, using more (renewable) electricity actually has no net effect at all, as it is purely from additional production, which is only available because you use it. I live in a region in Germany with a lot of wind and solar and I regularly see my PV plant be capped by the local energy company and the wind turbines around my village standing still despite a stiff breeze. Every kwh I use from my own PV in this case is free energy in the most expansive meaning of the word.
- throwaway2037 2mo agoThere is plenty to see in Indonesia at a fraction of the cost. It is almost always better value for money to scuba dive in developing countries.
- tonyedgecombe 2mo agoThe point is by getting on a plane and funding its emissions you are taking part in the destruction of something you supposedly value.
- eigenspace 2mo agoThe elevated temperatures actually reduce the efficiency of solar panels. The increase is due to more panels, not more solar flux on Germany.
- cassepipe 2mo agoTurns out the glass was half-empty and half-empty then
- A_D_E_P_T 2mo agoGlass half full, I suppose. Germany is in the grip of an unusual and prolonged drought -- clear skies, intense daytime heat, no rain. > https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c78gn8zvrx4o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c78gn8zvrx4o I'm near Graz, in Austria, where we're also in the middle of a drought and in truth I can't remember a summer as hot as this one...
- toomuchtodo 2mo agoEurope is only going to get hotter and more dry for the foreseeable future. Extreme Heat Has Transformed What Summer Means Across Generations in Europe - https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/01/world/europe/europe-summer-heat-germany-climate-change.html https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/01/world/europe/europe-summe... | https://archive.today/XsX2m https://archive.today/XsX2m - August 1st, 2026 Europe’s Heatwaves Are a Taste of the Climate Costs Yet to Come - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2026-07-27/europe-s-heatwaves-are-a-taste-of-the-climate-change-costs-yet-to-come https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2026-07-27/europe... | https://archive.today/AqWba https://archive.today/AqWba - July 27th, 2026 Why Is Europe Warming Twice as Fast as the World Average? - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-06-26/europe-heat-wave-how-record-breaking-temperatures-cause-widespread-disruption https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-06-26/europe-he... | https://archive.today/o68OH https://archive.today/o68OH - June 26th, 2026
- spwa4 2mo agoTLDR: 3 reasons. First the quickest warming is actually the poles (technically the south pole) which means the North pole cools Europe less. Europe's reduction in CO2 and other pollutants output, cause both more sunlight to hit the ground in Europe and make the likelihood of big airflows coming from the South (ie. Sahara) larger. And yeah, my read is that this is more arguments in favor of: it doesn't matter which way CO2 evolves, we'll need to take control over the climate if we want cities to remain where they are.
- actionfromafar 2mo agoWe could start by running container ships on High Sulphur Fuel Oil. Same CO2, more cushion against Sun Rays.
- tyromaniac 2mo agoAnyone know why they dont just say 12TWh?
- swolios 2mo agobecause it drives clicks
- NKosmatos 2mo agoWhenever I see news like this one I feel bad for us in Greece... we have so much sun yet we don't utilize it to the maximum we could for generating electricity and our KWh price is one of the most expensive in Europe. It's a pitty the government doesn't invest in solar or encourage households to do so :-(
- Rnonymous 2mo agoI see this in so many sunny countries, which is such a shame. So what prevents you from just installing panels on your roof?
- tonyedgecombe 2mo agoGDP per capita in Greece is €29,696, in Germany it is €65,303. Rich countries can afford to decarbonise more quickly.
- toasty228 2mo agoSolar panels are basically free at that point, they're pay themselves in <2 years in Greece. We're not talking about a 20k euros investment, even 1k would go a long way
- Hendrikto 2mo agoEven way less than that. 1000W solar panels + 800W micro inverter can be bought for roughly 250€ right now.
- andruby 2mo agoHas it become that cheap? Do you have a link?
- Hendrikto 2mo agoYeah, it is incredible: https://www.netto-online.de/balkonkraftwerk-1000w-800w-solaranlage-steckerfertig-wifi-komplettset-photovoltaik-anlage-800w-kabellaenge-5m/p-2865810000 https://www.netto-online.de/balkonkraftwerk-1000w-800w-solar... For those not speaking German: Base price (incl. tax) for the bundle is 210€, plus 60€ shipping, minus 30€ sale, so 240€ for a complete set, including tax and delivery.
- coffeebeqn 2mo ago12 TWh
- Faaak 2mo agoBut how many AAA-batteries is that?
- moebrowne 2mo agoStandard NiMH AAA battery is ~1Wh so 12 Trillion (12,000,000,000,000)
- tonyedgecombe 2mo agoAbout 8 trillion: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AAA_battery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AAA_battery
- fhdkweig 2mo agoTo answer tyromaniac's question that is dead and therefore I can't reply to: The United States utility companies bill by the kWh, so American-centric news will report in multiples of that unit. And as a sidenote, why do people downvote a question rather than answer it? Some of us like answering questions and deadening a question removes that ability.
- tuetuopay 2mo agoEuropean utilities also bill by the kWh, the markets bill by the MW or MWh (depending on the market product), yet we’d still use TWh to write this number. The American way of handling units is always surprising.
- john_strinlai 2mo ago>And as a sidenote, why do people downvote a question rather than answer it? Some of us like answering questions and deadening a question removes that ability. if its just [dead] (no [flagged]), as the case with tyromaniac, that's automated by the site (suspected spam/ai/bot/etc.). the comment can be vouched for to lose the [dead] status by users with 500+ karma (i think? maybe 1000) comments don't gain [dead] due to downvoting.
- scary-size 2mo agoYey, we contribute 432 kWh to that. Northern Germany, small 6.3 kWp system.
- stkdump 2mo ago817 kWh here. Though june last year was the record at 904 kWh. Maybe the effect is that solar panels lose efficiency when too hot.
- swiftcoder 2mo ago> Maybe the effect is that solar panels lose efficiency when too hot They do. One of the odd fringe benefits of agrovoltaics is that the plants beneath the panel slightly lower the panel temperatures through transpiration.
- tfourb 2mo agoSame effect for green (planted) roofs. They can increase pv production above them by around 5% annually our installer told us.
- madduci 2mo ago530 kWh here in July pushed to the grid with a 5kWp system
- tfourb 2mo ago1.8 MWh, highest production since we built our 12 kWp system five years ago.
- umpalumpaaa 2mo agoGermany has still one of the highest electricity and energy prices among developed nations which tremendously hurts its industrial base. That has to change too unless this cannot really be called a success I think.
- tonyedgecombe 2mo agoThe further we go down the renewables route the less we depend on despotic states for our energy. Energy may well be cheap in the US but you have been paying for that for decades through military misadventures in the middle east.
- Lord-Jobo 2mo agoIt’s not possible to truly estimate what our military costs would be without those conflicts, but I would be interested in our energy costs if you incorporated the military costs into that. I’m willing to bet we pay more than nearly anyone else if you lump it in relatively fairly.
- hunterpayne 2mo agoThe GWOT was 7% of the US military budget. Also, the US doesn't get oil from the Middle East anymore. Its been about 10 years since we did.
- bradfa 2mo agoWe've gotten pretty good at digging holes in the ground and there's a lot of existing energy down there under our land (and near-by water). So yes, we've certainly had misadventures in the middle east, but we've also embraced the "drill baby drill" mantra of late. Texas is probably our national leader in terms of deploying solar and wind power, which feels ironic but is totally rational and logical.
- toasty228 2mo ago> The further we go down the renewables route the less we depend on despotic states for our energy. 80% of solar panels/batteries/windmills are made in China. We wouldn't even be able to make them without fossil fuels in the first place. Not even talking about the electronics that is needed
- AlexandrB 2mo ago> He noted that the term “solar subsidy” can be misleading, as it implies that every kilowatt-hour of solar electricity fed into the grid is fully funded by public money. > The IWR explained that Germany’s Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) operates on a differential cost model for new photovoltaic systems. Under the mechanism, electricity generated by solar installations is first sold on the power exchange, with the resulting market revenues credited to the EEG account. Only the difference between the market price and the statutory feed-in tariff is compensated through the EEG account. Wait, this is still being subsidized by taxpayers? And Germany has some of the highest energy prices in Europe? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. On the one hand folks are happy to tout solar and wind as "the cheapest energy you can get" and on the other we have the market realities of what consumers and taxpayers are paying. There's a policy failure somewhere if the cheapness to produce energy this way is not being reflected in the market and subsidy structure. Does anyone have an analysis of wtf is going on?
- mertbio 2mo agoI'm a consumer in Germany, and I pay 250€ for 1.200 kWh (my yearly consumption). I don't know anyone who is paying those high prices mentioned in the articles. There are many electricity providers in Germany, and that creates competition; therefore, you get a lot of cash back by switching providers.
- KellyCriterion 2mo agoThats around 20 EUR per month - please tell us the provider! :-))
- exabrial 2mo agoGood progress. Germany also shut down its nuclear sector and made up for it by burning crap tons of coal.
- eigenspace 2mo agoCoal usage in Germany has continued to shrink throughout the nuclear shutdown. It's at the lowest level it's been since the early days of industrialization. I agree that nuclear should not have been phased out at the very least until coal was gone, but don't make up shit and say that they made up for the nuclear exit by burning more coal, that is untrue. Germany made up for it by building more renewables.
- k_g_b_ 2mo agoThis. Plus the fact that it would have been politically absolutely infeasible to get anyone except the Greens to agree on a coal before nuclear phase out at any point until at least 2018. SPD, CDU especially were and are very close to to the coal industry (voters, company boards, etc.). In addition, without the Greens-pushed and initiated renewables subsidies, there would have been basically no big market worldwide for solar manufacturing to even be built out the way it was and all solar tech and industrialization would likely not be as good as it is now.
- myk9001 2mo ago> ... Greens-pushed and initiated renewables subsidies, there would have been basically no big market worldwide for solar... Are you referring specifically to a German political party? Because that's a lot of credit to attribute to a single party in a single country. It might be well deserved, but seeing some supporting data would be nice.
- k_g_b_ 2mo agohttps://ourworldindata.org/grapher/solar-electricity-per-capita?tab=line&time=2003..2018&country=ESP~PRT~AUS~NZL~IND~USA~ZAF~DEU https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/solar-electricity-per-cap... The only other even slightly comparable country is Spain and they don't start until 2006/7. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Renewable_Energy_Sources_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Renewable_Energy_Source... where the laws that kick-started that. Under a SPD-Greens government - it wouldn't have happened with the conservatives or (market) liberals, that's clear.
- madwolf 2mo agoSoo... 12 TWh? Isn't that why we have metric prefixes? So we don't have to say that there's 12 billion of something...
- fred_is_fred 2mo ago120 trillion dWh is how I like to think about this. Very impressive.
- SoftTalker 2mo agoBillion can mean different things in different parts of the world. kilo-, mega-, giga-, tera- are the standard prefixes.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- swiftcoder 2mo agoOutside of tech circles, it's pretty normal to avoid using the uncommon prefixes. Nobody says the Earth has a 40 megameter circumference...
- toasty228 2mo agoCool, a quarter of the country is in a "D4 exceptional drought" (1 in 50 years), half of the rest in a 1 in 30 years drought and the rest in good ol' regular drought. But the sun do be bright indeed
- clarionbell 2mo agoIt would be nice if that led to lower prices. All the comparisons I could find are showing Germany near the top for electricity price. https://energyfactbook.com/world/electricity-prices-by-country/ https://energyfactbook.com/world/electricity-prices-by-count...
- dminuoso 2mo agoMerit-order pricing keeps consumer prices high. Whether it is the best mechanism to incentivize a transition towards renewable energy sources is debatable, but OP at least implies that we’re on the right direction. At some point we will have enough renewables to turn off the old and expensive gas and coal plants. Until then we just have to live with the feeling that it’s an investment towards future generations. Perhaps humanities biggest flaw is to prioritize instant gratification over long term benefits.
- cloudie78 2mo ago[dead]
- woofwoofwoof 2mo agoSecond heatwave in two months helps, I guess
- WorldPeas 2mo agoperhaps this will help them lessen dependence on energy from Western Sahara https://wsrw.org/en/news/renewable-energy https://wsrw.org/en/news/renewable-energy
- ChrisArchitect 2mo agoRelated: Wind and solar overtake fossil fuels in Germany for the first time https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49155359 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49155359