
Progress has been limited on Germany's shift from nuclear to renewables - howard941
https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/german-failure-on-the-road-to-a-renewable-future-a-1266586.html
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est31
It's very popular to criticize the Energiewende as a failure because it
apparently failed to reduce CO2 emmissions of the whole country. And of
course, it's true that Germany could have had greater reductions if nuclear
was kept alive instead of coal. But the Energiewende actually _changed_
Germany. Suddenly everywhere you go you have solar panel farms and many houses
have them on their roofs and there are wind turbines. It was a cool time to
live in germany to see these projects realized everywhere. They were done in
an era where the price of renewables was very high compared to other
technologies. The big contribution that Germany has done to the world with the
Energiewende is:

* demonstrating that an industrialized nation actually can start a gradual transition towards renewables and most importantly

* by buying renewables at high prices, helping the manufacturers to get the price of renewables down. I think it's partially thanks to Germany that renewables have become the cheapest form of elecricity generation this fast, with impact observable around the globe!

From that second point alone I think the Energiewende should be considered a
success. Could it have been better? Sure. Is it perfect? No. Do I like the
high energy prices now? No. But I'm definitely glad we had it.

Also consider that we here Germany in fact do have a nuclear catastrophy right
below our feet in the form of Asse 2.

~~~
realusername
> But the Energiewende actually changed Germany. Suddenly everywhere you go
> you have solar panel farms and many houses have them on their roofs and
> there are wind turbines. It was a cool time to live in germany to see these
> projects realized everywhere

Does it really matter to see all those solar panel farms if the end result is
they were not much helpful? The money which went into this is absolutely
massive and could have been used in a better way to fight climate change.

~~~
netsharc
I'm pretty sure if the survival of human race is at stake, money is no object.
If someone in a foreign country invented a machine that everyone can buy to
make themselves carbon-positive, the logical move for any government would be
subsidize the purchase, even if that means great debt: but as the planet
continues surviving, the country will go on collecting tax revenue from
productive citizens/businesses and will be able to pay its debt back.

Being afraid of government debt if you're a stable country is illogical: it's
also why Germany can borrow money at negative interest rates, meaning people
would actually rather lend money to Germany and get less back in a few years,
rather than park it at a bank. Unlike a business or an individual, the lender
has very little risk that the stable country will go bust/get hit by a car and
can't earn money to repay the bank.

~~~
hackeraccount
The point is that while you can spend a lot of money you can't spend infinite
money. There's a finite pile of euros. Every euro you spend on something
stupid is one less euro you can spend on something smart.

~~~
cygx
Money is a tool of social organization that lacks instrinsic value. Any time
we as a society refuse to do something worthwhile for the sole reason that it
would cost too much, that's a capitulation to human stupidity and/or greed.

~~~
ehaliewicz2
It's not so much about money, the implication is that making solar panels
costs some amount of resources that according to the parent, could possibly be
spent in better ways. The money just represents, indirectly, the amount of
resources.

~~~
cygx
The question is, what's the limiting factor: Availability of manpower, natural
resources, etc, or 'merely' the money to pay for them? The latter is an
artificial constraint.

Take nuclear fusion as an example: Supposedly, this is a case where the
projected investments necessary to go from theory to practice just haven't
been made. With return of investment only anticipated in the far-off future,
it was decided that the money could be spent in better ways.

~~~
ehaliewicz2
Obviously money again is only representing some value or resource. You have to
compensate workers or else they won't do any work (unless you plan on
enslaving them, or have the government provide for all their needs).

------
jseliger
Germany and California could already have near-zero greenhouse gas emissions
from power production:
[https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/09/11...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/09/11/had-
they-bet-on-nuclear-not-renewables-germany-california-would-already-
have-100-clean-power). The technology already exists. The problems are chiefly
political.

~~~
Bombthecat
Still waiting for an answer what to do with the waste. Beside

A) dumping in the ground and hope for the best

B) some magic tech will pop which will solve the issue.

~~~
Luc
It's pretty benign as waste goes. It just sits there and gets less dangerous
as time goes on.

You could just keep it in a bunker and pay a crew to dust it off and repackage
it when needed for the next 1000 years. But no, for some reason it needs to be
taken out of the environment, like in the famous Australian sketch...

~~~
C14L
And, if technology keeps improving, at some point there will be tech to easily
recycle all that "waste". Because it still contains energy.

~~~
hef19898
They are doing that at Sellafield in the UK. Which is in itself pretty ugly
business.

EDIT: The business is ugly, not the fact that it is in the UK.

------
liminal
It's crazy to move from Nuclear to coal for the sake of the environment.
Renewables are great when the sun is shining and the wind is blowing, but the
rest of the time Nuclear is the better choice

~~~
spython
There was a radioactive cloud over most of Europe after Chernobyl. It is much
harder politically to defend nuclear energy once you lived through that
disaster.

~~~
i_am_proteus
There's a cloud of particulants from burning coal and oil over most of
Europe--- and it has killed orders of magnitude more people than contamination
from Chernobyl.

~~~
juped
Even if radiation is your only concern, coal emissions disperse a lot of
radiation into the environment! (Still not very much radiation in absolute
terms - but more radiation than the nuclear industry emits.)

~~~
piker
> more radiation than the nuclear industry emits

buried the lede there

------
yourMadness
For those of you that want to see the data behind this story:
[https://www.energy-charts.de/energy.htm?source=all-
sources&p...](https://www.energy-charts.de/energy.htm?source=all-
sources&period=annual&year=all)

I think the history is one of a failed economic subsidy program that
accidentally accelerated the PV-industry by a few years.

There were several growing PV manufacturers in germany up to around
2011/2012\. In that timeframe the manufacturers were all busy building new
factories, but the government noticed that the subsidy program became large
enough to be expensive and suddenly severely cut the subsidies. None of the
manufacturers survived that, the remains were sold to the chinese.

~~~
cygx
Some relevant numbers (TWh) from that graphic:

    
    
                    2002    2018
        Total        503     545
        Coal + Oil   253     205
        Gas           40      44
        Nuclear      156      72

~~~
jhayward
So, they've successfully got rid of about 50% of nuclear and 20% of coal by
adding a very small amount of gas generation. Presumably the rest is coming
from renewables. Sounds like a pretty good progress report.

~~~
cygx
_Presumably the rest is coming from renewables._

No reason not to complete the picture, I guess:

    
    
                        2002    2018
    
        Total            503     545
    
        Coal+Oil         253     205
        Nuclear          156      72
    
        Gas               40      44
        Biomass            4      45
    
        Wind+Solar+Hydro  39     177
    
        Other             10       3

------
geff82
The Energiewende is actually one of the reasons I still live in Germany: I
want to see how it happens. It is stuff that our grandchildren will be proud
of. And by the way, private energy consumption is heavily taxed (for a good
reason), yet energy hungry industries are exempt from it. And they feel the
effect: because of the growing effect of the renewable energies, they now pay
one of the lowest electricity prices in the world.

There are actually good books that explain how all this works, why there are
also short term "unsuccessful" years and how about everything will benefit in
the end. And, most importantly: why the Energiewende actually enables a
comfortable, good life.

~~~
sampo
> It is stuff that our grandchildren will be proud of.

The French can be proud today, consuming electricity with 1/6 of the carbon
footprint per kWh, compared to electricity in Germany. And paying half the
price, too, compared to what electricity costs in Germany.

[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S136192091...](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1361920916307933)

~~~
geff82
CO2 is not the only thing that counts. One of those "clean" nuclear plants
blows up and we can essentially close our countries or all die of cancer.

~~~
jwr
Nuclear plants do not "blow up", at least not the ones that are built after
Chernobyl. Please stop spreading FUD.

~~~
jhayward
Why do you keep posting this lie?

Chernobyl's unit 4 was destroyed by an explosion.

Fukushima had multiple explosions that destroyed the upper levels of reactor
buildings, and ruptured the containment of unit 2.

During the three mile island accident there were several days where engineers
were sweating bullets because there was a hydrogen gas bubble at the top of
the pressure vessel, and they were afraid it would explode. It was only after
about a week of effort that they were able to eliminate the H2 bubble.

Every nuclear reactor has the possibility of immense damage due to explosion -
steam explosions, explosive gas, and secondary systems such as diesel and
electrical system. It is one of the primary hazards that control systems and
emergency cooling and venting are there to deal with. Lying to everyone that
it's not possible isn't helpful to the nuclear community.

~~~
Nimitz14
They do not blow up in the sense of a nuclear explosion. It's a normal
explosion. With normal consequences.

~~~
anoncake
They blow up in the sense of a dirty bomb. That's a lot worse. It would be
great if NPPs just blew up in a nuclear explosion! We could safely use them by
making the blast radius a forbidden zone.

~~~
Nimitz14
> They blow up in the sense of a dirty bomb. That's a lot worse. It would be
> great if NPPs just blew up in a nuclear explosion! We could safely use them
> by making the blast radius a forbidden zone.

I do not know how to respond politely to such a ridiculous statement.

~~~
anoncake
Then please explain impolitely where you think I'm wrong.

To clarify: “great” is no absolute, an NPP that generates electricity is
obviously better than one that explodes. It also depends on the size of the
explosion. A Hiroshima-class explosion would be acceptable, the one of a tsar
bomb might not be. Also an NPP that fails like that would still kill its
operators and perhaps some unlucky farmers. But compared to the actual worst
case, that's negligible.

------
BiasRegularizer
I believe nuclear power is inevitable. Human power consumption has been
growing exponentially, at some point renewable energy will not be able to
catch up without causing extensive damage to our ecological system. There are
finite amount of renewable energy per sqkm on earth, at some point the area
required will begin to erode local ecology. Right now nuclear power appears to
be the densest form of energy generation. I agree in the short term renewable
energy is a great alternative to coal/natural gas.

~~~
anoncake
> Human power consumption has been growing exponentially

That has to stop. Power generation cannot grow exponentially forever

------
tim333
I've always thought it would be more efficient to use a market system with
something like a carbon tax and charges for other externalities rather than ad
hoc policies for this and that.

------
HocusLocus
Nuclear or nothing, because with nuclear you need nothing else.

~~~
anoncake
Except for a few spare cities for when the ones you have are made
uninhabitable by a nuclear accident.

