Coal is used for chemical processes, heating (locally and remote) and also generating electrical energy (also locally and remote). From those, only remote electricity can easily be replaced, remote heating might be replaceable, but would take some investments and not sure if this wouldn't be more expensive and quite inefficient. Anything locally working can't be replaced easily, and forget chemical processes.
And yes, coal is also used to compensate for fluctuations, but those are only very little numbers. AFAIK the harm from having nuclear plants idling around is far bigger.
Gosh, is this the level of your understanding? Not everything in the energy-sector is about burning down something and getting electricity from the heat.
Coal is using in chemical processes for smelting, producing steel and other metals, creating concrete and other chemical compounds.
> If coal seems to be special/different, and not replaceable by other generation forms, why is the plan to get rid of it?
Because the plans are about replacing whole processes, fabrics, plants, devices, products... It's not as simple as just switching a cable or making a new contract with a new provider. You basically have to build a new house, and that's time-consuming and expensive.
> Coal is using in chemical processes for smelting, producing steel and other metals, creating concrete and other chemical compounds.
Canada has lots of steel/metal production, and yet Ontario and Quebec (two largest local production centres), have managed to either not have coal in the first place or get rid of it.
Ontario gave a timeline to retire coal, and there's no reason why Germany could not have done the same:
Use of coke in smelting is not energy production and therefore outside of scope for the coal sourced energy discussion. Energy for smelting seems like base load to me since you can't just turn off a smelter randomly and instead they run for years at a time.
