No, not no to drugs. Just say no to energy. Electricity was yesterday.
No nuclear energy, no coal energy. Not much sun either for solar energy. There’s lots of wind in Germany, though. Hot air mostly but still.
Germany is first major economy to phase out coal and nuclear – German lawmakers have finalized the country’s long-awaited phase-out of coal as an energy source, backing a plan that environmental groups say isn’t ambitious enough and free marketeers criticize as a waste of taxpayers’ money.
Bills approved by both houses of parliament Friday envision shutting down the last coal-fired power plant by 2038 and spending some 40 billion euros ($45 billion) to help affected regions cope with the transition.
The plan is part of Germany’s ‘energy transition’ – an effort to wean Europe’s biggest economy off planet-warming fossil fuels and generate all of the country’s considerable energy needs from renewable sources. Achieving that goal is made harder than in comparable countries such as France and Britain because of Germany’s existing commitment to also phase out nuclear power by the end of 2022.
Just kidding. Hardy, har, har. Everybody knows Germans don’t have nuclear power plants anymore. Well, not many. One less now for sure.
Former German nuke plant towers demolished in morning blasts – The two cooling towers of a former nuclear power plant in southwestern Germany have been demolished in a pair of early-morning explosions whose timing was kept under wraps to prevent crowds from gathering during the coronavirus pandemic
We’ve shut down practically all of our nuclear power plants already.
Of course, we had to replace them with dirty coal-firing ones but we’ll be shutting those down soon too. Unfortunately, the renewable utopia we ordained those many years ago still isn’t working yet for some odd reason nor does it look like it will anytime soon. But still. At least the energy prices German consumers have to pay keep climbing and climbing to ever ridiculously high and higher levels. Maybe we could start cutting off power in German homes and industries for a few hours every day and get the populace to stop making so much CO2 that way – and spend more time out in “nature.” It would only be for their own good. Then the rest of the world would admire us yet again for the fine example we have set and start emulating us with gratitude (we are the Big Green and Moral Superpower, after all). Then Planet Earth and Planet Germany would be rescued in no time.
Germany shuts down atomic plant as nuclear phase-out enters final stretch – The Philippsburg power station is one of the only plants still operating in the southern state of Baden-Württemberg. Germany has vowed to start decommissioning every nuclear power facility by the end of 2022.
Angela Merkel’s blunder of the decade that’s taboo in Germany (he means before her blunder in 2015).
How about thousands of them? And then you’re allowed to subsidize them all?
You’d hat them too.
Germany’s Giant Windmills Are Wildly Unpopular – Local politics are a bigger problem for renewable energy growth than competition from fossil fuels.
Despite their surging popularity in Germany and elsewhere in Europe, the Greens did badly in last Sunday’s election in the German state of Thuringia, and the nationalists from the Alternative for Germany Party (AfD) did very well. An important reason is that the Greens support wind energy and the AfD militates against wind turbines. The giant windmills have grown so unpopular in neighboring communities that their construction in Germany has all but ground to a halt.
There are nearly 30,000 wind turbines in Germany, more than anywhere else in Europe. Only China and the U.S., both much bigger countries, have more. Germany gets 23.5% of its energy from wind this year; it’s the biggest source of renewable energy for the country. But in the first half of 2019, only 35 wind turbines were added — an 82% drop compared with the first six months of 2018. Last year was bad, too: Just 743 turbines were added, compared with 1,792 in 2017.
To everything turn, turn, turn
There is a season turn, turn, turn
A time to buid up
A time to break down…
Germany’s wind power industry could shed about 40% of its jobs because of sliding interest among investors to build turbines on land, threatening a key driver of the nation’s ambitious clean energy targets.
Environmental rules are snagging license approval for scores of onshore projects, causing delays of as long as two years, according to a report by Psephos GmbH for Germany’s VDMA machine makers lobby group. As developers and investors shy away from auctions and wading through the thicket of red tape, construction of new parks is grinding to a halt and putting jobs in jeopardy.
Deutschland ist weltweit Vorreiter bei der Energiewende – dem Umstieg auf erneuerbare Energien. Doch ausgerechnet im wichtigsten Erneuerbaren-Bereich im deutschen Markt gibt es große Probleme.
Or everyday German schizophrenia in action, if you prefer – in this case with regard to Germany’s famous/infamous green energy policy.
“Germany is not a trendsetter. Germany is a dependent tag behind. Gas will come from Russia in the future while we impose sanctions on the Russians at the same time. Electricity will come from nuclear reactors and coal-fired power stations in neighboring countries while we simultaneously disparage them for being environmental villeins. Security will be provided by the NATO partner USA who we permanently abuse in the most savage manner. Sadly, political Germany suffers from megalomania and ineptitude at the same time. If one wants something, one finds a way. If one doesn’t want something, one finds the reasons.”
Deutschland ist nicht Vorreiter. Deutschland ist abhängiger Hinterherhinker. Gas kommt künftig aus Russland, das gleichzeitig mit Sanktionen behängt wird. Strom kommt künftig aus den Atomreaktoren und Kohlekraftwerken der Nachbarländer, die gleichzeitig als Umweltsünder und Schrottreaktoren verunglimpft werden. Sicherheit kommt vom NATO-Partner USA, der permanent aufs Übelste beschimpft wird. Das politische Deutschland leidet leider an Größenwahn, gepaart mit Unfähigkeit. Wer etwas will, findet Wege. Wer etwas nicht will, findet Gründe.
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.
That means deficient. As in the deficient quality of the oil being imported to Europe via a Russian pipeline – this import having now been suspended by Poland?
That means Germany can’t get the oil, either. It’s not like Germany’s dependency on Russian gas and oil is deficient, however. That’s as high a quality dependency as you can get.
Germany and Poland have suspended imports of Russian oil amid contamination concerns, prompting a rare crisis over supply from the world’s second-largest exporter.
The sudden suspension of imports from the Soviet-built Druzhba pipeline, which runs from Russia via Belarus to central Europe, risks starving major European refineries of their major source of crude.
Händler großer Ölkonzerne, die Raffinerien in Deutschland betreiben, bestätigten dies: Die Versorgung über die noch von der Sowjetunion gebauten “Druschba”, auf Deutsch “Freundschaft”, sei gestoppt.
And France is going to help the Germans score… Right?
Nord Stream 2 pipeline row highlights Germany’s energy dependence on Russia – Almost a third of the new Nord Stream gas pipeline has been laid across the Baltic Sea. There is, however, growing opposition to the pipeline — and Brussels is having difficulty figuring out how to deal with the project…
Germany is pressuring other European capitals to block an EU proposal to regulate Russia’s Nord Stream 2 pipeline ahead of a key meeting on Friday, diplomatic sources said, but may fail to convince France, threatening the project’s construction.
Twenty years of government subsidies apparently aren’t enough to make German wind parks profitable.
Once the subsidies run out in 2020 thousands of perfectly functioning wind turbines will have to be taken out of service. You can only make money with this technology if its subsidized by the tax payer? Maybe there’s something wrong with this business model.
Doch damit ist Ende 2020 Schluss – die Förderung gibt es nur für zwanzig Jahre. Was tun? Die Anlagen einfach abreißen, obwohl sie noch bestens in Schuss sind? Oder lässt sich mit ihnen auch ohne staatliche Unterstützung Geld verdienen?
