“Progress has been limited…”

May 14, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hideology, Higher Education, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings Tags: Consumers, Electricity, Energy, Energy Turnaround, German, Germans, Germany, Nuclear energy, Renewable energy Leave a comment

Oh, I dunno. Depends upon how you look at it.

In 2011, German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced the country was turning away from nuclear energy in favor of a renewable future. Since then, however, progress has been limited. Berlin has wasted billions of euros and resistance is mounting…

But there’s been plenty of change here, although I wouldn’t call it progress. Lots of people can’t afford to pay their power bills in Germany – the country with the highest energy costs for consumers in Europe. Could there possibly be a connection to the “energy turnaround” here?

More than 340,000 electricity customers across Germany have their power cut off each year for failing to pay bills. A new proposal from one political party aims to change this.

Germany Finally Prepared To Help Iraq

May 1, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Hypocrisy Tags: Business, Electricity, German, Germans, Germany, Iraq, Profit Leave a comment

Out of the goodness of its heart. With a giant electricity agreement worth billions.

The Germans may not have been prepared to help free the country from Saddam Hussein militarily but they have finally taken a great step forward and are now prepared to free it from lots and lots of money makes the world go around.

Iraq and German giant Siemens have signed a framework electricity agreement potentially worth billions of dollars. The Iraqi premier was in Berlin to meet with Chancellor Angela Merkel.

“Our claim is that we are a reliable and affordable power supplier to the people of Iraq and want to help them rebuild their country.”

“Germany” To Protect Consumers From Rising Electricity Prices?

January 23, 2019 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hideology, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy, Hysteria Tags: Coal-Fired Power Plants, Consumers, Electricity, German, Germans, Germany, Government Waste, Nuclear power, Renewable energy, Taxation 1 Comment

The rising electricity prices that “Germany” caused in the first place, you mean?

Well, not quite. The “German taxpayer” will have to protect consumers from these rising prices, as usual. It’s a brilliant business plan that only governments like “Germany” can think up. The consumer/taxpayer pays twice, see? It’s not like anybody has to ask them.

Germany is planning to protect consumers and manufacturers from the impact of abandoning cheap coal-fired power, which Berlin is looking to ditch for environmental reasons, according to a government body’s draft paper.

The Coal Commission, which is tasked with organizing the exit from coal, said in a 133-page draft document seen by Reuters that companies and private households should be spared from heavy price increases.

“The necessary funds must be made available by the state to finance the recommended measures.”

German Of The Day: Preiserhöhung

November 18, 2018 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hideology, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hysteria Tags: CO2, Coal-Firing Power Plants, Consumers, Costs, Electricity, Energy, Government Intervention, Lignite, Nuclear energy, Renewable energy Leave a comment

That means price rise. For German electricity bills, in this case. Another big one on the way. Wonder why?

Keen to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and transform its energy sector, German leaders adopted a vast program called Energiewende eight years ago and the country prides itself on setting the pace for change in the European Union…

But earlier this year, officials admitted the country will not hit the 2020 goal, saying it would reach 32 percent at best (40 percent was the goal).

Greenhouse gas emissions in Germany have not decreased for the last nine years and emissions from the transportation sector have not fallen since 1990. In fact, the United States has reduced carbon emissions more than Germany, in both real and nominal terms…

The growing pains have led to higher prices, largely shouldered by residential power customers.

Between 2015 and 2017, Germany inched ahead of Denmark for the highest electricity prices for household customers (35 cents per kilowatt-hour, in U.S. currency), according to the statistical office of the European Union.

Viele deutsche Haushalte müssen im kommenden Jahr deutlich mehr für Strom bezahlen. Berechnungen von Online-Vergleichsportalen zeigen, dass die Preise in der Grundversorgung um durchschnittlich vier bis fünf Prozent steigen werden.

Irresistible Filth?

October 10, 2018 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Hideology, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings, Hysteria Tags: Brown Coal, CO2, Coal-Firing Power Plants, Electricity, Energy, Fukushima, German, Germans, Germany, Lignite, Nuclear energy Leave a comment

I guess that’s one thing you could call it.

As previously reported, the Germans are having big problems meeting their ambitious CO2 emissions targets these days. One of the reasons for this dirty little secret – after having turned off most of their nuclear power plants due to a tsunami in Japan (don’t ask) – is their burning need to burn dirty, filthy, dreckig brown coal, aka lignite.

It is mined in vast, open pits that devour landscapes and villages, leaving Martian vistas of desolation roamed by gigantic excavators straight out of “Mad Max”.

Brown coal made up about 23% of the country’s energy supply last year, and black coal another 14%, according to the Economy Ministry. Renewable energy sources made up 33%—up from 6% in 2000.

Hey, whatever gets you through the dark as black coal night.

“The image of Germany as a country leading on the renewable energy transition is very, very wrong,”

I Got The Power

February 26, 2018 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hideology, Home Cooking, Hurt Feelings Tags: Atomic energy, Clean Power, Cost, Electricity, Energy, German, Germans, Germany, Power, Renewable energy Leave a comment

Electricity bills, actually. Big ones. And talk about renewable. These bills just keep on coming and coming and growing and growing…

Voter support for Angela Merkel’s long-standing pledge for climate protection risks being undermined by stubbornly high pollution levels and power prices.

Average retail power costs are set to climb 111 percent since 2000, when guaranteed subsidies for wind, solar and biomass power first started being added to consumers’ bills, forecasts from the BDEW utilities federation showed last week. Germany may for the first time move up a notch to share with Denmark the highest household energy bills in the EU.

It’s more evidence that gains in wind and solar power competitiveness have yet to trickle down to consumers, frustrating the aim of keeping Merkel’s green energy transition affordable.

“I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

Now That’s Putting It A Little Drastic

November 15, 2017 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Helplessness, Hideology, Home Cooking, Hypocrisy Tags: Alternative Energy, CO2, Coal, Electricity, Energy, German, Germans, Germany, Language Leave a comment

But wenn man recht hat, hat man recht. But when you’re right, you’re right.

Germany Is a Coal-Burning, Gas-Guzzling Climate Change Hypocrite.

Just this summer, German Chancellor Angela Merkel read U.S. President Donald Trump the riot act for pulling out of the Paris climate accord, chiding the United States for ignoring and perpetuating climate change…

Yet Germany’s image as selfless defender of the climate, which was once largely deserved, is now a transparent fiction. Germany has fallen badly behind on its pledges to sink its own greenhouse gas pollutants. In fact, Germany’s carbon emissions haven’t declined for nearly a decade and the German Environment Agency calculated that Germany emitted 906 million tons of CO2 in 2016 — the highest in Europe — compared to 902 million in 2015. And 2017’s interim numbers suggest emissions are going to tick up again this year.

Germany’s Green Planners Confident That Growing Wind And Solar Power Will Lead To Even Higher Power Costs

May 9, 2017 By Hermann Observer in Habitudes, Hard Facts, Heconomy, Helplessness, Hurt Feelings Tags: Electricity, Energy, German, Germans, Germany, Green Power, Nuclear power, Solar Power, Wind Energy Leave a comment

But who cares, right? There’ still Luft nach oben (room for improvement). Germans are only number two when it comes to paying the highest electricity bills in Europe (only the Danes pay more).

Germans already footing the second-highest electricity bills in Europe may face even higher costs from the country’s decision to exit nuclear power early next decade. While there’s no risk of blackouts, costs could rise if transmission gaps emerge, according to Germany’s Bnetza regulator. Europe’s biggest power market is closing its last atomic plants in 2022 and is counting on a mix of mothballed lignite plants, wind and solar power expansion and grid stability measures to keep outages down…

Consumers this year may pay about 24 billion euros ($26.4 billion) in compulsory clean-energy-support fees, levies that are added directly to power bills.

“The lights will stay on. Yet there are two risks in bridging power gaps, namely redispatch and intervention in the market to drive generation up or down that may be cost factors.”

Volkswagen To Build E-Cars

June 16, 2016 By Hermann Observer in Hard Facts, Helplessness, Hi-tech, High Art, Home Cooking, Humor, Hurt Feelings, Hypocrisy Tags: Diesel, Dieselgate, E-cars, Electricity, German, Germans, Germany, Humor, Volkswagen 2 Comments

But they haven’t figured out how to equip them with diesel emissions test cheating software yet.

The sleazy, crooked, dirtball of a company also hopes to introduce more self-driving vehicles in the near future. If those work out, self-purchasing models will be the next logical step. And after that, who knows? The Welt or something.

Volkswagen unveiled a plan for the next decade containing culture change, as it strives to compete in an industry moving towards e-cars, self-driving systems and on-demand mobility – all while it deals with Dieselgate.

Mit Elektroautos in die Zukunft!

The Next Thing You Know They’ll Be Selling These On Ebay

February 2, 2015 By Hermann Observer in Heconomy, Helplessness, Hi-tech, Hideology, Home Cooking, Hysteria Tags: Coal, Electricity, Energy, German, Germans, Germany, Power, Power Plants, Renewable energy, Utilities Leave a comment

Germany’s utilities, battered by the country’s shift to wind turbines and solar panels, would be glad to sell you a power plant on the cheap. They’ll even pack it up and ship it to another country.

The two largest power producers, RWE AG and EON SE, are especially keen to sell their gas-fired plants, rendered uncompetitive by the rise of renewable energy on the one hand and record low coal prices on the other. It’s a relatively easy task to take them apart, move them by truck and ship and reassemble them elsewhere.

“There is a liquid global market for gas turbines. Transport costs are entirely marginal.”

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